Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PRIVATE BUSINESS

NOTTINGHAM CITY COUNCIL BILL

Considered; to be read the Third time.

BRITISH RAILWAYS BILL

(By Order)

BRITISH TRANSPORT DOCKS BILL

(By Order)

LONDON TRANSPORT BILL

(By Order)

Orders for Second Reading read.

To be read a Second time upon Thursday next.

Oral Answers to Questions — AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD

Butter, Milk and Cheese

Mr. Raphael Tuck: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what is the estimated increase in price for the coming year of butter, milk and cheese.

The Minister of State for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. S. Bishop): As far as the price of milk is concerned, I refer my hon. Friend to the statement which my right hon. Friend made on 8th March on the determinations following the annual review. It is not possible to estimate the extent of the likely increases in the prices of butter and cheese, which will depend upon a number of factors, particularly the extent to which market conditions will allow price and cost increases to be passed on to the consumer, and the level of subsidies.

Mr. Tuck: Bearing in mind the fact that, even before the latest staggering increases, the EEC price of butter was more than three times the world price, can my hon. Friend say what proportion of these increases will be due to our membership of the Common Market?

Mr. Bishop: It is difficult to give my hon. Friend an exact reply. If changes in the EEC institutional prices agreed at Brussels are fully reflected at the retail level, the price of butter could rise by 8p or 9p per pound and cheese by 5p or 6p per pound by the end of the year. The bulk of the increases results not from the agreement on prices for 1976–77, but from the need to meet our obligation under the Treaty of Accession to align United Kingdom prices with Community prices by the beginning of 1978. That Treaty was signed by the Conservative Party.

Mr. Geraint Howells: Does the hon. Gentleman expect the price review award to dairy farmers this year to increase dairy production to his satisfaction?

Mr. Bishop: The hon. Gentleman has made an important point. When comparing EEC and non-EEC prices one must bear in mind the important factor of food security.

Mr. Pym: Does the hon. Gentleman agree with Commissioner Lardinois that Great Britain's membership of the Common Market had resulted in food in this country being cheaper than it would otherwise have been?

Mr. Bishop: Yes, and I also agreed with Commissioner Lardinois when he said that my right hon. Friend had got a good package from the recent proposals.

Mr. Crawshaw: Does my hon. Friend remember that it was only a few months ago that margarine manufacturers were complaining that, because of the cheapness of butter, they were unable to sell their product?

Mr. Bishop: That is a matter of consumer choice.

Oral Answers to Questions — Price Review (Consumer Interests)

Mr. Gould: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what consideration he gave to consumer interests in reaching agreement on the


common agricultural policy price review proposals.

The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Fred Peart): I gave the fullest possible consideration to the needs of consumers within the overall national interest.

Mr. Gould: Does not my right hon. Friend agree that the proposed package of food price rises is bad news not only for the consumer but for the taxpayer, who will have to pay to get rid of food surpluses which consumers cannot afford? Does not this further turn of the CAP screw undermine the whole basis of the Government's counter-inflation policy?

Mr. Peart: I cannot accept that. The effect by the end of the year of the price review, details of which I announced on 8th March, may be to add 1¼ per cent. to the retail food index. I remind my hon. Friends that the farm workers' leader, Mr. Reg Bottini, has said that he believes that farm workers will benefit from this deal.

Mr. Michael Latham: Is it not important in the interests of consumers that there should be a steady expansion of our domestic agricultural industry, and does not that mean realistic prices?

Mr. Peart: I fully accept the hon. Gentleman's point. Hon. Members who criticise the deal must realise that it conforms with the Government's policy in the White Paper "Food from our own resources".

Oral Answers to Questions — United Kingdom Wine Production

Mr. James Lamond: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he is satisfied that United Kingdom wine producers are not adversely affected by United Kingdom membership of the EEC.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Gavin Strang): The special position of wine producers in the United Kingdom is recognised in the Community and has been safeguarded by the recent decisions of the Council.

Mr. Lamond: Has my hon. Friend read the article in "Horticulture Industry" for February, which states that the EEC will be applying to the industry stringent regulations, including sample

testing by an official station for five consecutive years? Will not that threaten a small but developing industry?

Mr. Strang: I have not read the article, but my hon. Friend will welcome my right hon. Friend's success in resisting a ban on the planting of vineyards in this country. Furthermore, he will accept that the Community rules relating to the production and marketing of wine are applicable in this country and that there is no evidence that they are detrimental to the industry.

Oral Answers to Questions — Horticulture

Mr. Baker: asked the Minister or Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what recent progress has been made in the EEC towards the harmonisation of fuel prices for growers in the glasshouse sector of horticulture.

Mr. Strang: The Commission has set guidelines for national fuel aids to horticulture. Under the guidelines, subsidies on the cost of heating oil must end by 1st July 1976. There is also a condition that, if an oil subsidy is paid, steps must be taken to bring the price of gas up to the fuel oil price equivalent, after subsidy.

Mr. Blaker: Is the Parliamentary Secretary aware that although he was described in a recent issue of the Grower as a good listener, he has yet to satisfy the House that he is also a doer? Does what the Minister said mean that at last he has succeeded in putting British growers on an equal basis with their competitors in the EEC in relation to the price of fuel?

Mr. Strang: I am happy to receive compliments from all quarters, including the Grower. On 30th June 1976 permission to make payments in aid to glasshouse producers will cease. To that extent we have been successful in resisting any extension of these guidelines.

Mr. Watkinson: Is my hon. Friend satisfied that British horticultural growers are able to compete satisfactorily with their Dutch counterparts?

Mr. Strang: Yes, I am satisfied. We must bear in mind that labour costs in Holland are substantially higher than they are in this country, and the biggest boost and protection to the indigenous horticulture industry is that since the last


Question Time the value of the pound has fallen.

Oral Answers to Questions — Green Pound

Mr. Brotherton: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food by how much the green pound differs in value from the Irish green pound.

Mr. Peart: The United Kingdom green pound equals 1·75560 units of account and the Irish green pound equals 1·69653 units of account.

Mr. Brotherton: Will the Minister take steps to give the British farmer the benefits that the Irish farmer gets from the value of the green pound? Will he tell the House by what date he expects to be able to bring the green pound into line with the value of the pound sterling?

Mr. Peart: I cannot give a date. As the hon. Gentleman knows, I have made four changes—in October 1974 and in February, August and October 1975. I keep under review the level of the green pound, but I have to have regard to the interests of both producers and consumers.

Mr. Powell: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the constant dislocation, unfairness, loss of employment and malpractices which result from this disparity and anomaly between the two green pounds taken in conjunction with the open frontier?

Mr. Peart: I have said previously, and I made clear in Brussels, that we should have to take action if it were shown that Northern Ireland's interest was being damaged. I am watching the situation closely.

Mr. Pym: Does the Minister agree that the distortions and disparities, which are occurring at an ever-increasing pace, are so disrupting the operation of the common agricultural policy that it is seriously threatened? Does he agree that it is vital that Finance Ministers should take firm, resolute and urgent action to get the monetary situation more aligned so that the CAP can work harmoniously and properly?

Mr. Peart: The right hon. Gentleman should address that Question to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I agree with Commissioner Lardinois, whose speech

the right hon. Gentleman heard, that this is a serious matter which must be examined carefully.

Mr. Crawford: Does the Minister agree that the benefit gained by the Irish shows what can be done under self-government, and would not Scotland benefit equally from self-government?

Mr. Peart: On the contrary, it is a great tragedy that Southern Ireland is not still in the British Commonwealth as well as in the EEC.

Mr. Stonehouse: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what further adjustment is required in the green pound and other factors affecting domestic prices of food in view of the continual decline in the value of sterling; and what effect these changes will have on the prices of staple foods during the next 12 months.

Mr. Peart: There is no requirement to adjust the green pound because of changes in the market exchange rate of sterling, but I keep the green pound under review. As no change in the green pound is currently being made, the second part of the Question does not arise.

Mr. Stonehouse: Does my right hon. Friend agree with the figures given by Commissioner Lardinois last Tuesday— that the Community paid a subsidy to Britain of £190 million last year, which is equivalent to about one third of the subsidies paid on food, and that currently the Community is subsidising British food to the extent of £15 million per month? As the fall in the value of sterling against European currencies since the last adjustment in the green pound last October is 8 per cent., is not another adjustment required soon?

Mr. Peart: I naturally accept that a fall in the value of sterling tends to increase the price of imported foods, although this increase may be offset for a number of major agricultural commodities by the operation of the MCAs. That is why I agree with Mr. Lardinois.

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: Would not it be better if the right hon. Gentleman announced a 5 per cent. limit on the disparity between the green pound and the


exchange rate? It is no good the right hon. Gentleman quoting how many times he has altered it. The pound goes down and down. Will not he announce a limit so that, when it is reached, there will be an automatic devaluation? That is what the industry needs.

Mr. Peart: I cannot accept the argument about an automatic devaluation. I have answered that before. But I have made four adjustments, and I keep the matter under review.

Mr. Torney: Is my right hon. Friend aware that Commissioner Lardinois, talking in London this week about the terrible mess of the common agricultural policy, suggested that Britain should reconsider her decision to lower food subsidies? Is not this a very good idea? Will my right hon. Friend allow food subsidies to continue as they are, because of the ever-rising cost of our food?

Mr. Peart: That is another matter which is not covered by the original Question.

Mr. Watt: Does the Minister agree that the present disparity with the green pound is encouraging racketeering in the movement of grain and meat between the various countries? Can he say whether the Commission is looking into the many rackets going on at the moment?

Mr. Peart: I can only repeat what I said earlier. Naturally, I am concerned with matters affecting the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic, and I have stated that we are watching the position carefully.

Mr. Cryer: Does my right hon. Friend agree that on Tuesday of this week Mr. Lardinois also said that unless we had economic and monetary union, the EEC would collapse? Does my right hon. Friend agree with that view? Will he encourage the revision of our own independent currency to bring about the collapse, which is perhaps about the best thing that could happen for British agriculture?

Mr. Peart: We must look at this matter constructively. I will not commit myself on matters which need careful study. However, my hon. Friend and others who are anxious to destroy the common agricultural policy do not realise how that will endanger our food supplies.

Mr. Pym: Does the Minister appreciate that Mr. Lardinois did not use those words? He said—and I repeated it today—that unless the monetary distortions and disparities were ironed out, the common agricultural policy would not have a chance. That is the important point, and that is what I asked the Minister to urge upon the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Mr. Peart: Yes, I agree with the right hon. Member for Cambridgeshire (Mr. Pym). My hon. Friend had got the wrong end of the stick.

Oral Answers to Questions — Skimmed Milk Powder

Mr. Nicholas Winterton: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, what is the present level of stocks of skimmed milk powder in the United Kingdom.

Mr. Marten: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make a statement about the current size and cost of the skimmed milk powder mountain.

Mr. Peart: Stocks of skimmed milk powder in EEC intervention stores on 11th March were 1,158,000 metric tons, of which 29,000 metric tons were held by the United Kingdom Intervention Board. These stocks have accumulated over several years as a result of the operation of the system of intervention purchases and sales by which the common agricultural policy underpins the market. As these transactions take place continuously, it is not possible to state the total cost of the balance in store at any one time.

Mr. Winterton: Will it not cost British farmers at least an extra £28 million to pay for the 60,000 tons that will be imported if the incorporation scheme is accepted? Is it not particularly unfair to poultry and pig farmers, and does it not make a nonsense of the Government's policy to peg costs?

Mr. Peart: I do not agree. The hon. Gentleman is exaggerating. The figure is 40,000 tons. I agree that there is a problem. I do not like the incorporation system, and I said so in Brussels. I am in touch with the trade and I want to make the procedures as smooth as possible for the trade.

Mr. Marten: Does not this mountain illustrate the absurdity of the intervention system? Was not the Minister's decision in Brussels to agree to these regulations contrary to the wishes of the House, and why did he make it?

Mr. Peart: I am rather surprised at the hon. Gentleman's supplementary question because he is a member of the Scrutiny Committee which said that further consideration of proposals need not delay adoption by the Council should such adoption prove necessary in the course of negotiations to achieve a satisfactory settlement of the whole package.

Mr. Marten: I disagreed.

Mr. Peart: The hon. Gentleman may have disagreed, but his Committee did not, and the Chairman, the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Mr. Silverman) took another line.

Mr. Scott-Hopkins: Will the right hon. Gentleman clarify the deposit scheme? Will there not be 12 categories of the level of deposit for the import of soya and protein before there can be equivalent withdrawal? What will these categories be? How much money will be required? What will be the duration of the scheme? What are the terms for repayment?

Mr. Peart: I cannot give that information. Talks are continuing on this subject. I shall be only too pleased to follow up the matter with the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Buchan: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the skimmed milk and price proposals will ensure the continuation of a mountain of skimmed milk? Bearing in mind that skimmed milk costs about four times as much as any other additive, will not the cost of incorporation in the poultry industry alone add about £6 million, which will have to be borne by the British consumer?

Mr. Peart: I hope that my hon. Friend will accept that I criticised the scheme. I am anxious that we should have a working scheme. I know that there are problems, but it is a once-for-all scheme and I hope that hon. Members will not exaggerate the problems.

Mr. Jopling: Will the right hon. Gentleman reconsider his answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, West (Mr. Scott-Hopkins)? He is unable

to give details of a scheme which is already in operation, and that is intolerable. I ask the right hon. Gentleman not to turn his mind in favour of the scheme until the House has had a chance to debate it. Will he also turn his mind to the possibility of renegotiating the scheme if, as seems likely, it has the universal condemnation of both sides of the House and of the trade?

Mr. Peart: The hon. Gentleman knows that I presented the scheme and I was prepared to debate it, but, because of events in the House, we were unable to proceed. This is a matter for the Leader of the House. I do not dissent from what the hon. Gentleman said, but I believe that it would have been wrong for me to hold up the whole package of the price review by sticking firmly against the scheme.

Oral Answers to Questions — Forestry Commission (Chairman)

Mr. Andrew F. Bennett: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will announce the name of the next Chairman of the Forestry Commission.

Mr. Strang: No, Sir. As indicated in the reply my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Fife, Central (Mr. Hamilton) on 4th March, the chairmanship of the Forestry Commission is among the appointments on which the Prime Minister advises the Queen and he would be responsible for an announcement.

Mr. Bennett: Does my hon. Friend appreciate how much enjoyment the Forestry Commission has given in recent years by the expansion of its recreational facilities? Is he aware of the large num-best of jobs that it has created? In consultations leading to the appointment of the new Chairman, will he urge that whoever is appointed should continue this expansion?

Mr. Strang: I agree that recreation is an increasingly important part of the Commission's functions. I am satisfied that the new Chairman, when he is appointed, will recognise that.

Mr. Jasper More: Will the hon. Gentleman stress to the Prime Minister that the new Chairman must be someone who is conversant with the contribution made


to forestry by the private sector? Great though the achievements of the Commission have been, does he agree that forestry cannot survive without the active cooperation of private planters and that they cannot do their job unless the present taxation system is radically reformed?

Mr. Strang: I agree that the new Chairman should recognise the contribution of both the State and private sectors of forestry.

Mr. Hardy: Will my hon. Friend ensure that the next Chairman of this most attractive and successful area of the public sector enjoys the success and respect enjoyed by the present Chairman?

Mr. Strang: I endorse that tribute to the present Chairman. The Forestry Commission is a splendid example of public enterprise and I hope that the new Chairman will continue with its policies.

Mr. Body: Did not Lord Taylor announce his retirement in November? Why has there been this delay?

Mr. Strang: Lord Taylor intends to continue in his post until June this year, but we shall be making an announcement before then.

Miss Maynard: On this occasion will my hon. Friend appoint someone who believes in public ownership? At the same time, will he put some forestry workers' representatives on the Commission and not so many landowners and people who believe in having a commercial timber trade?

Mr. Strang: I wholly share my hon. Friend's sentiments. It seems to me that we want a Chairman who believes in public enterprise and who wants to make a success of it. It is important that the Commission should reflect the aspirations of the workers in the industry.

Oral Answers to Questions — Dock Work Regulation Bill

Mr. Crawford: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what further representations he has received to date from farming interests in Scotland concerning the possible effects of the Dock Work Regulation Bill.

Mr. Peart: I have received no representations since my reply to the hon. Member for Harborough (Mr. Farr) on 26th February.

Mr. Crawford: Will the Minister do everything in his power to persuade his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment not to extend the scheme to Perth Harbour? The scheme could result in the closure of Perth Harbour and could do irreparable damage to farmers throughout Perthshire.

Mr. Peart: The Bill is still going through the House. I am always consulted about harbour matters and I shall take careful note of what the hon. Gentleman has said.

Mr. Clemitson: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that any extension of the scheme will be subject to an affirmative Order of both Houses?

Mr. Peart: I think that hon. Members know that.

Mr. Sproat: Does the Minister accept that the application of the Bill to non-scheme ports, not only Perth—there are 120 in Scotland—would have a ruinous effect on the livelihoods of farmers and on the nation's food supply? It would put a stranglehold on food supplies, the supply of raw materials and foodstuffs to farmers, with its consequent effect on egg, pig and poultry production.

Mr. Peart: I cannot accept that. The hon. Gentleman should not exaggerate. The Bill is in Committee and there will be ample time for discussion.

Oral Answers to Questions — Fishing Industry

Mr. Henderson: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make a statement on the current position of the fishing industry.

Mr. Bishop: I would refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave him on 29th January. Since then, first-hand prices have fallen in accordance with the usual seasonal pattern. Nevertheless, firsthand prices are still generally well above the levels prevailing at this time in any of the last few years.—[Vol. 904, c. 295.]

Mr. Henderson: Does the Minister accept that one of the most important aspects of the current position in the fishing industry is the renegotiation of the common fisheries policy? Does he consider it helpful for his right hon. Friend the Minister of State, Department of Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, to cut the ground from under the feet of


our negotiators by saying yesterday that there is no prospects of getting a 100-mile limit?

Mr. Bishop: The hon. Gentleman should put the matter in perspective. We have often made clear that the United Kingdom has a major interest in the fishing industry within the Community. What matters is not just the limitations— although they are important—but that the British fishing industry in future has access to waters which will give it the catches necessary to maintain viability.

Mr. Prescott: Does my hon. Friend agree that in reconsidering fisheries policies the Government should take into account the consequences of an agreement between Iceland and Britain? The EEC negotiations should deploy a strategy to revamp the industry and give a chance to deep sea ports such as Hull.

Mr. Bishop: I do not think that I need to add to what I have already said. We have done our best in the negotiations with Iceland with much tolerance to look after our industry. Catches in third country waters should be taken into account in the discussions on the future of the CFP. We want to maintain a viable fishing industry and the deliberations of the Law of the Sea Conference and on the CFP will have that in mind. It is difficult to talk about the future shape of the industry until these questions have been resolved.

Mr. Peter Mills: Will the Minister bear in mind that the current position of the fishing industry in the South-West is extremely serious, particularly for mackerel fishing, due to certain fishermen coming down from Scotland and other parts of the world and depleting stocks of mackerel? Will he take steps to see that these stocks are conserved?

Mr. Henderson: Stay out of our waters.

Mr. Bishop: I will resist the temptation to become involved in the family quarrel on the other side of the House. I have no comments to make on the insistence of the Scottish National Party on fishing rights within 200 miles of Scottish shores. The waters around our coasts are British and are available to British shipping.
The hon. Gentleman will know of the discussions we have had about these matters with the producers' organisations. The problem is not one of shortage so much as of good supply. I am hoping to visit the South-West for a couple of days next week to discuss the matter further.

Mr. Robert Hughes: Does my hon. Friend recollect that in our various debates on fishing the Government have always refused to state any definite fisheries policy on the ground that they did not wish to display our negotiating hand for renegotiating the CFP? Did not yesterday's statement give away our negotiating hand?

Mr. Bishop: I do not know to which statement my hon. Friend is referring. If he is referring to the meeting of my right hon. Friend the Minister of State with the Scrutiny Committee, I should tell him that I was present. We did our best to give as much information as possible to that Committee without saying too much. Basically, we have made clear our insistence on ensuring the viability of our fishing industry, which is the major fishing industry in the Community.

Mr. Luce: Is the Minister aware that fishermen off the South coast feel increasingly threatened by the over-fishing of their grounds, due not just to the problems off Cornwall but to abuse of the quota system by Belgian trawlers and over efficient methods of fishing, such as beam trawling? What will he do to protect the interests of the inshore fishermen?

Mr. Bishop: The hon. Gentleman will be aware that we do not regard beam trawling as scientifically bad for the fish stocks. We have insisted on the need for the quota system to be reinforced. This is a matter which we are bearing in mind.

Mr. James Johnson: Does my hon. Friend accept that all these political arguments—the Law of the Sea Conference, the common fisheries policy, and the like—lie ahead, whereas now, both north and south of the Tweed, the fleets are in difficult financial circumstances? Therefore, will he consider immediately some form of operational subsidy by which, as in the past, the situation is salvaged by the payment of so much per day per ship when at sea?

Mr. Bishop: I recognise my hon. Friend's continuing interest in the industry and its problems. Although costs have increased, so have earnings overall. It is interesting to note that the earnings of the Scottish industry, for example, rose by 17 per cent.—that is £1·8 million— in January and February of this year compared with the same period of 1975. I recognise the importance of the points made by my hon. Friend, but he will be aware of the aid that we have given the industry in the past 12 months— including vessel grants, loans, harbour works, scientific support, research and development, as well as the temporary subsidy. My right hon. Friend has said that he will examine any well documented case of overwhelming need if it is put to him.

Mr. Pym: Is the Minister aware of the serious further deterioration in the financial position of the industry since we last debated it five weeks ago, with ships being laid up and sold and workshops being closed down? Is not the position we have reached so serious that the Prime Minister himself should join in discussions with other Heads of State in the Community to bring this important matter to a rapid conclusion? Is it not that serious now?

Mr. Bishop: I appreciate the right hon. Gentleman's concern. But he will know that, under the Treaty of Accession, the present common fisheries policy continues until 1982. In April last year my right hon. Friend said that this was an urgent matter. Talks are still under way. In the fishing debate only a few weeks ago my right hon. Friend said that he would examine any well documented case of overwhelming need for financial aid. I appreciate the points made by the British Trawlers Federation recently and its demand for help for the industry. No one can say that the Government have been late with the aid, last year and at present, which the industry has needed.

Oral Answers to Questions — Brucellosis

Mr. David Steel: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will backdate the increased compensation payments under the new brucellosis eradication schemes to 1st November 1975.

Mr. Strang: My right hon. Friends the Minister and the Secretary of State for

Scotland are considering this matter in the light of the representations that have been made.

Mr. Steel: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that I am pleased to hear that answer? However, will he take on board the fact that the NFU was negotiating this matter way back last June and that farmers in Roxburghshire and probably elsewhere allowed their cattle to be slaughtered because they thought that the payments would take effect from last November and they now face serious financial losses unless this decision is reconsidered?

Mr. Strang: These are some of the arguments that we are considering. However, the hon. Gentleman will understand that we have to take these decisions against the background of the Government's constraints on public expenditure.

Mr. Monro: Does the Minister accept that this is a very serious problem? Will he consider giving way about the date of 1st November and going back to the beginning of the eradication year, which was 1st June for many areas in Scotland and in the rest of the United Kingdom? Will he consider this matter urgently, because many farmers wish to purchase stock now?

Mr. Strang: We are giving it urgent consideration. However, the hon. Gentleman is going a little far when he talks about retrospection further back than 1st November. All the discussions have been on the basis that the claim is for retrospection to 1st November.

Mr. Boscawen: Although we welcome the increase in the upper limit of compensation outside Scotland, there are still problems for herds in areas which are not compulsorily eradication areas. Although they get compensation still, farmers are at much greater risk in those areas than in compulsory eradication areas. Will the Minister ensure that something is done to improve the amount going to these areas to encourage those in eradication-free areas to stay in the scheme?

Mr. Strang: I cannot accept that there are not continuing benefits for herds to remain in the scheme. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will have welcomed our announcement some time ago outlining


our plans for the complete eradication of brucellosis.

Oral Answers to Questions — North East Atlantic Fisheries Agreements

Mr. Trotter: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many tons of fish from the North Sea have been granted by him under quota to Communist countries under the North East Alantic Fisheries Agreements.

Mr. Bishop: By international agreement the North-East Atlantic Fisheries Commission is responsible for the management of fish stocks in the North Sea. Quotas are negotiated by the fifteen member States of the Commission taking into account traditional fishing patterns.

Mr. Trotter: May I ask the Minister how many more of our fishermen have to join the dole queues before he will accept that the industry is in need of help? Having given way weakly over quotas, will he assure the House that there will be no such action when defending the interests of the industry in Common Market negotiations?

Mr. Bishop: If the hon. Gentleman is suggesting that we have not had our fair share of the quotas under the North-East Atlantic Fisheries Commission allocations, I remind him that in the North Sea the total amount of fish for all countries is 718,000 tons of which the United Kingdom has 213,000 tons and the Communist countries 76,000 tons. The basis of the decisions on quotas is the state of the fish stocks, and the maximum sustainable yields as given by the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea and other advisory bodies on fishing resources.

Mr. Jopling: Will not the Minister of State realise that these excessively low priced imports are just one of the factors causing the fishing industry to be in an even greater mess than at any time during the last two years? Will he further realise that we are sick to death of his answers that he is having talks and discussions and considering matters? Will he take up the suggestion by my right hon. Friend the Member for Cambridgeshire (Mr. Pym) a few moments ago— that this matter should be put into the hands of the Prime Minister to see whether he can retrieve the industry from its tragic position?

Mr. Bishop: The hon. Gentleman must know that we have had to start from the position in which his Government left us some years ago when they negotiated the Treaty of Accession. We have done our best, in the last year or two in which we have been responsible to give the industry the wind of support it needs, pending the outcome of the Law of the Sea Conference and the reappraisal of the common fisheries policy. The industry has had improvements as a result of our efforts and we are pursuing the negotiations most urgently.

Oral Answers to Questions — Agricultural Land (Access)

Mr. Stainton: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what is the total number of officials from his Department who have right of access to agricultural land.

Mr. Peart: The number of officials of the Ministry who possess powers of entry to agricultural land is approximately 1,630. This figure does not include those veterinary surgeons in private practice who also possess these powers and receive fees from public funds for carrying out statutory duties.

Mr. Stainton: Although I acknowledge that animal and plant health requires supervision, as does the checking of capital grants, is there not a material difference between the answer given now by the Minister and the answer given to my hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (Mr. Wiggin) on 10th February, that the total number was 2,110, representing 72 categories? Is it not alarming that there can be such a large difference between two replies? Will the Minister tell us what is the trend?

Mr. Peart: My reply did not include veterinary surgeons. In view of the complexity of agricultural legislation important to the working farmer, it is essential for various reasons to have an adequate inspectorate and officials able to give advice.

Oral Answers to Questions — Agricultural Mortgages

Mr. MacGregor: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what the value of loans made by the Agricultural Mortgage Corporation was in 1974 and 1975.

Mr. Peart: Loans made to the industry by the Agricultural Mortgage Corporation Ltd. during the years ending 31st March 1974 and 31st March 1975 were £47·9 million and £37·9 million respectively.

Mr. MacGregor: Has the Minister seen a recent statement from the managing director of the Agricultural Mortgage Corporation producing devastating arguments about the danger of taking capital out of agriculture, a danger fully reflected in the recent decline of investment shown in the annual price review? In view of this, will the Minister now take steps to impress upon the Chancellor of the Exchequer the urgent need to change the capital taxation on agriculture so as to remove this threat?

Mr. Peart: I am aware of that statement, and I share the concern about the effects of capital taxation. We have had an interdepartmental committee looking at this question. I cannot report on it finally to the House, but I regard it as a serious matter. On the other hand, there has been an improvement in cash flow, and I believe that the package we agreed in Brussels is a good one for the working farmer.

Sir David Renton: But does not the right hon. Gentleman remember that as long ago as last July he told us that he was having this inquiry made by the interdepartmental committee? Will he give us the benefit of its conclusions as soon as possible?

Mr. Peart: I will do so as soon as possible.

Mr. Stephen Ross: Will the Minister tell the House what progress has been made in the EEC towards a land bank structure, such as other EEC countries have, as he well knows that in this country the AMC rates are excessively high?

Mr. Peart: The land bank concept of subsidising credit is not as good as the capital grant system that we have. I was glad to mention in the recent review that we are to have £30 million extra on capital grants.

Mr. Pym: In his desire to provide extra capital for agriculture, will the right hon. Gentleman explain how farmers can be expected to put in hand new schemes before the details of the improved

proposals have been announced? How soon will he give full details of the extra help that he intends to provide?

Mr. Peart: I gave the broad picture when I announced my review. I accept that the working farmer needs further detatils, and these will be provided.

Oral Answers to Questions — SCOTTISH TRADES UNION CONGRESS

Mr. James Lamond: asked the Prime Minister if he will be addressing the Scottish Trades Union Congress in 1976.

The Prime Minister (Mr. Harold Wilson): No, Sir.

Mr. Lamond: Would this not have been an excellent opportunity for my right hon. Friend to remind the Scottish Trades Union Congress that the solution to the problems facing the people of Scotland and elsewhere lies in the application of Socialist principles, and that the important thing for them is to see that these Socialist decisions are made—not the city in which they are made?

The Prime Minister: I agree totally with my hon. Friend on this question. I am sure that the majority of the Scottish people recognise this, just as they recognise, equally, that any vote on their part for the Scottish National Party is a vote for separatism.

Mr. Donald Stewart: When he meets the STUC, will the right hon. Gentleman congratulate it on its superior knowledge of the situation in Scotland, as compared with that of the Labour Party in Scotland? If he accepts that one Member in the House is a majority and a mandate, will he say whether that would apply if 36 SNP Members were elected to Westminster?

The Prime Minister: I am not sure that I follow the hon. Member. I am certainly clear that the Scottish TUC, which has played a very important rôle in matters affecting the future of Scotland, would be the first to agree with me that it is against separatism, which is the policy of the Scottish National Party.

Mr. Norman Lamont: The hon. Member for Oldham, East (Mr. Lamond) asked about Socialist principles. Would


the Prime Minister care to say why the news of his resignation was greeted with a pin-striped panic and a short, sharp fall both in sterling and on the Stock Exchange? Was it, as some of his hon. Friends believe, because he is the most Conservative Prime Minister of all time, or was it the appalling prospect presented by any of the six people standing for the leadership today?

The Prime Minister: It is not for me to fathom the mystery of why people, sometime out of ignorance, occasionally out of malice, and sometimes out of perception, buy or sell shares on the Stock Exchange. My forecast was a fall of 15 per cent. and it was 15·7 per cent.

Oral Answers to Questions — PRIME MINISTER (VISITS)

Mr. Blaker: asked the Prime Minister if he will pay an official visit to Pretoria.

The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the reply which I gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, South (Mr. George) on 18th March, Sir.

Mr. Blaker: As the Government have been in touch with the South African Government about the withdrawal of the remaining South African troops from Angola, may I direct the Prime Minister's attention to the presence of much more numerous Cuban forces still in that country? As Dr. Fidel Castro made a statement last week in Conakry implying that Cuba might have a rôle to play in other countries in Southern Africa, is it not important that those Cuban forces, too, should be withdrawn? What are the Government doing about that?

The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs has made clear, as I have, our views about intervention in Angola, but the Cuban forces have not in the last few weeks been requested by any other country in the area to intervene in its territory. If they were to intervene in any other territory, there would be a new and extremely serious situation. We have made this clear to all concerned in recent weeks as I have already informed the House.

Mr. Robert Hughes: If my right hon. Friend should visit Pretoria, would he

make it clear to the South African Government that our Government give no recognition whatever to the bogus independence of the Bantustans?

The Prime Minister: Yes, we have already made that clear. This is a matter which any Government would have to decide upon. If a request for recognition as an independent State were to be received from one of the Bantustans, it would be considered in the light of the well-established criteria for recognition in all the relevant circumstances of the time. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs explained to the House on 10th March that this was the Government's position. We think it most unlikely that the Transkei would fulfil the criteria necessary for recognition.

Mr. George Gardiner: asked the Prime Minister if he will pay an official visit to Pretoria.

The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the reply which I gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, South (Mr. George) on 18th March, Sir.

Mr. Gardiner: Further to the question by my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool, South (Mr. Blaker), Mr. Gromyko this morning dismissed any question of possible Soviet involvement in Rhodesia as a fairy tale. Since Angola was clearly not a fairy tale, did the Prime Minister secure an assurance from Mr. Gromyko while he was in London that Soviet equipment would not be used to support aggression across any frontiers in Southern Africa?

The Prime Minister: We have made clear both in the meeting I had at my initiative with the Soviet Ambassador a week or two ago and in the most recent talks our views on the question of any overseas intervention in what was previously British territory in that part of Africa.

Mr. Ioan Evans: Does my right hon. Friend recall the speech of a previous Conservative leader, Mr. Harold Macmillan, when he spoke about the wind of change? Since it is now reaching gale force in Rhodesia and since two leaders in this House are supporting changes to reduce racial discrimination in that part of the world, should not the Leader of the Opposition now get


up and support the stand made by the United Nations, the Organisation of African Unity, and other organisations?

The Prime Minister: The question of Rhodesia was fully dealt with by my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary earlier this week. Successive Governments—Labour in the 1960s and Conservative in the early 1970s—negotiated and discussed with Mr. Smith, and no solution was forthcoming which any British Government could accept. I believe that that is still the position. I am sure, too, that the Leader of the Opposition, who was a committed member of the Government of the right hon. Member for Sidcup (Mr. Heath), will agree that we have laid down standards throughout which are binding on all parties in the House. Even if in the famous debate the Conservative Party split three ways, the record of its Government in office has fully confirmed the line we have always taken.

Oral Answers to Questions — PRESS (ROYAL COMMISSION)

Mr. Lawson: asked the Prime Minister when he expects to receive the final report of the Royal Commission on the Press.

The Prime Minister: The Royal Commission on the Press hopes to present its final report early in 1977.

Mr. Lawson: Since this may be my last opportunity to say it—[Hon. Members: "Good-bye".]—may I say how much I shall miss asking the Prime Minister important questions, confident in the knowledge that I shall never receive an answer? When the right hon. Gentleman gives his evidence to the Royal Commission, will he explain his curious resignation remark about forgiving the Press? For what trespasses does he forgive them?

The Prime Minister: I have every confidence that when the hon. Member fulfils his promise to the House, we shall win Blaby. The hon. Member has always been an interesting questioner, although usually on the wrong lines. At a time like this, however, one should forgive the Press and all its sinful enormities. To answer the hon. Member's question in full would probably mean the disappearance of all further action on business today.

Mr. Skinner: Is my right hon. Friend aware that when the Royal Commission on the Press finally reports my right hon. Friend will be taking another seat in the House of Commons to listen to it? In line with the discussions that he and I had last night about where that seat will be, I have taken, as shop steward on behalf of the Front Bench below the Gangway, a few soundings of my colleagues. By a majority view they have decided that a novel arrangement could be arrived at whereby a seat can be arranged for my right hon. Friend at the end of this Bench provided that someone else is shunted off it and on to the Treasury Bench.

The Prime Minister: I am glad that my hon. Friend has disclosed to the House the nature of those very confidential discussions. I regard him as the shop steward of that Bench. I was asking only that I might be allowed to sit in the traditional place of someone in my future position, and I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Watford (Mr. Tuck) will move up a little. My hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) will be the first to agree that there was no deal or any question of a transfer from his Bench to this, and that matter will in any case not be under my direction.

Mr. Lipton: Is my right hon. Friend aware that my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) is not my shop steward? Will he take into account the fact that many of us do not want to know what he will be doing during the next week or two, and that all these questions are quite irrelevant?

The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is always helpful in these matters. Once when I was in difficulties on a Question he rose to ask whether I had had a good dinner—which I had. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for all his interventions. We have both been in this House a long time and I hope to be sitting alongside him in the near future.

Oral Answers to Questions — UNEMPLOYMENT (SCOTLAND)

Mr. Canavan: asked the Prime Minister whether he is satisfied with the co-ordination between the Secretaries of State for Scotland, Trade, Industry and


Employment in dealing with the unemployment situation in Scotland.

The Prime Minister: Yes, Sir.

Mr. Canavan: Since the latest Scottish unemployment figures are the only ones in Britain to show an increase, is it any surprise that more than 100,000 Scottish Workers went on strike yesterday to protest against unemployment? When my right hon. Friend shortly joins his comrades here on the Back Benches, will he try to use his considerable influence to ensure that his successor does not just get a new job for himself but tries to fight for jobs for other people by pursuing a Socialist policy of full employment?

The Prime Minister: The fact that there was a strike yesterday, obviously supported by my hon. Friend, was not a surprise: it was a disappointment. The most recent figures on unemployment, which have been tending this way for some three or four months, and one must not attach too much importance to a single month's figures, have actually fallen in all regions, except, seasonally corrected, in Scotland.
I hope that my hon. Friend will proclaim in all his powerful speeches north of the border that, in spite of what I have just said, the unemployment position in Scotland, relative to Britain as a whole, has improved substantially over the past two years. In March 1974 unemployment in Scotland was 56 per cent. above the rate for Britain as a whole. It has fallen progressively and the figure is now 19 per cent. I am sure that my hon. Friend will proclaim that fact all over his constituency and still wider in Scotland.

Mrs. Bain: Is the Prime Minister satisfied with the work of the Secretary of State for Scotland who stated categorically in the House yesterday that he did not regard the rising unemployment figure as disastrous? Is he aware that the SNP Members, like their colleagues in the STUC, certainly regard the figure as disastrous and have every intention of trying to rectify the situation by building an economy in a free Scotland?

The Prime Minister: I of course accept that the hon. Lady and her colleagues regard the rise as disastrous. What is clear to all hon. Members, except those

on her rather narrow Bench, is that if the SNP prescriptions were operated, unemployment in Scotland would be a great deal higher and the standard of living there a great deal lower as a result of their desire for divorcement, which, to be fair to them, they have never disguised. They are separatists and the people of Scotland are not.
I do not regard this small seasonally corrected increase as disastrous. I regard the present level of unemployment as intolerable and unacceptable, and I am glad that the House now recognises that we have reached a turning point both for the economy and for unemployment.

Dr. M. S. Miller: Without paying too much attention to the blandishments of SNP Members—and my right hon. Friend correctly states that if they had their way, the situation in Scotland would be completely disastrous—will my right hon. Friend use his considerable influence and good offices in Scotland to ensure that if there has to be a further degree of unemployment—which I do not accept— it is spread equally throughout the country and does not result in the closure of whole factories in Scotland?

The Prime Minister: I was not succumbing to blandishments. I was answering a perfectly fair question of the hon. Member for Dunbartonshire, East (Mrs. Bain), whom I always treat with great courtesy.
On the question of the spreading of unemployment, I have given the figures— that the unemployment relative, as it is called, has fallen from 156 to 119. As to particular factory closures, although Conservative Members and others voted against us, I think that we were right and that what we did has been proved to be right, not only on Chrysler but on Leyland, where a great deal of Scottish employment is involved. The House will have noted with great satisfaction, especially the Tories who voted against us, that over the last five months British Leyland, for the first time for a very long period, has been working not at a loss but covering itself.

Mr. David Steel: Before the Prime Minister finally lays down the reins of office at the end of the fifth ballot, will he take a look at the workings of the new Scottish Development Agency, which has some very serious problems on its


hands, and assess whether in terms of job creation in rural areas of Scotland it will be as effective as the old Small Industries Council and Development Commission undoubtedly were?

The Prime Minister: I note that the hon. Member refers to a fifth ballot. It is not for me to make forecasts about that. The hon. Gentleman will have noticed, however, the much greater dignity surrounding the question of the leadership of the Labour Party as compared with the action of so many of his hon. Friends, particularly the weightier ones—by "weightier" I am talking of bulk and not intelligence—[Interruption,] I know the hon. Member concerned. He was a Labour Party agent. He resigned because he objected to a Labour Government limiting the increase in council house rents which he wanted to raise. I guarantee not to shop him while I am speaking from this Bench.
The hon. Member for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles (Mr. Steel), having talked about the dignity with which we are conducting our succession at present, will nevertheless recognise that on these Scottish matters I have fully answered his question.

HOUSE OF COMMONS (SECURITY)

Mr. Brotherton (by Private Notice): Mr. Brotherton (by Private Notice) asked the Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons whether he will make a statement about the employment of a member of the Provisional IRA in the kitchens of the House of Commons.

The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Edward Short): Yes, Sir. The man who has been the subject of stories in the Press in the last few days was employed in the House on a casual basis between 3rd and 22nd March, when, I understand, the need for his services came to an end because the man whose place he was taking returned to duty on that date.
I am sure that you, Mr. Speaker, and the House will not expect me to comment in detail on this case, other than to say that there is no reason to suspect that the person concerned either has been or is a member of the IRA. This incident has, however, highlighted the security

problems which are inherent in the employment of casual labour. I held a meeting yesterday between those responsible for employment and those responsible for security to consider what could be done to tighten up the existing arrangements. Certain measures have already been agreed and those concerned are considering urgently what other measures are possible.

Mr. Brotherton: The House will be grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for that statement. However, is he satisfied that the security arrangements for this place are all that they might be? We must obviously bear in mind the architectural limitations of the Palace of Westminster. Nevertheless, we must accept that there is a certain amount of risk involved for those who work here, and we must be concerned for the safety not only of Members of Parliament but of others who work in the Palace of Westminster.
On the question of the employment of casual labour, will the Leader of the House assure us that some form of screening will be introduced so that people who might put this place at risk are not employed here on a temporary or permanent basis?

Mr. Short: On the first question, the answer is "No, Sir". I am not satisfied with the security of this building, but we are constantly reviewing it and trying to improve it. Your predecessor, Mr. Speaker, asked Sir James Starritt, of Scotland Yard, to undertake a review of security in the Palace of Westminster. The Report is now in your hands, and I understand that you will shortly be making a statement to the House on this matter.
On the second question, the additional measures about casual staff—I am sure that the House will not wish me to describe all the measures that we are taking-are that we shall be ensuring a very much closer liaison between the police and the departments employing casual labour; that we shall be demanding a much more stringent proof of identity from people employed casually; that search arrangements will be tightened; and that there will be much stricter control of the movement of casual workers in the Palace of Westminster. Other measures will be taken, too.

Mr. Raphael Tuck: Why is it that when people come in as visitors to Westminster Hall their bags are opened and they are examined and screened, whereas when someone comes in here to work, he or she is not screened at all and has complete freedom to move over the whole building? Is that not all upside-down?

Mr. Short: On the last point, we shall be limiting the areas of the building in which casual workers may move and the police will know where they are working. Casual workers enter the premises through Chancellor's Gate.

Mr. Stainton: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. May I put it to you, Mr. Speaker, that it would be in the best interests of the House not to pursue this question in further detail?

Mr. Speaker: I am proposing to call later the spokesman for the Opposition and, as I shall be making a statement in the very near future. I am then proposing to bring the discussion to an end.

Mr. Short: I agree with the hon. Member for Sudbury and Woodbridge (Mr. Stainton). What I was saying is that all casual workers enter by one entrance, Chancellor's Gate, and there is a very strict check on them as they come in there. I have seen the list of times that the gentleman concerned entered the premises, with the time that he entered and the number of the pass issued to him. We are doing a great deal now to tighten up. I should be grateful if I am not pressed much further on this matter.

Mr. Whitelaw: I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will accept that anyone who has had responsibility as Leader of the House knows very well that there is great difficulty in balancing the needs of the working of Parliament as we would all wish it to be with the needs of security at the same time. However, does not the right hon. Gentleman agree that an incident such as this—I should like to add that we support very much the measures that he has already taken—gives the Leader of the House and all those concerned an opportunity to remind everyone of their duties and to stop the inevitable slackness which always develops on security matters as long as nothing is going wrong?

Mr. Short: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman, who understands this place. There are two difficulties. One is that which he mentioned, of holding a balance between a free Parliament with reasonable access for the public, and, on the other hand, Draconian restrictions. The other difficulty is in running a department such as our catering department, which caters for about 2,000 people a day, but with a demand which fluctuates very much from day to day and week to week. That department employs casual labour. This is a great difficulty.
Those are the two difficulties, and we must hold a balance and do the best that we can.

Mr. Skinner: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker——

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Gentleman has given me notice of the point of order he wishes to raise. Perhaps we may deal with it a little later, after business questions.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Mrs. Thatcher: Will the Leader of the House announce the business for next week?

The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Edward Short): The business for next week will be as follows:
MONDAY 29TH MARCH and TUESDAY 30TH MARCH [Supply: 15th Allotted Day]—debate on the Green Paper on Direct Elections to the European Assembly, Command No. 6399.
At the end on Monday, remaining stages of the Rating (Caravan Sites) Bill [Lords].
At the end on Tuesday, remaining stages of the Fatal Accidents and Sudden Deaths Inquiry (Scotland) Bill [Lords] and of the Damages (Scotland) Bill [Lords].
WEDNESDAY 31ST MARCH and THURSDAY 1ST APRIL—debate on the Statement on the Defence Estimates 1976, Command No. 6432.
At the end on Wednesday, motion relating to the Fiduciary Note Issue (Extension of Period) Order.
At the end on Thursday, motion on the Industries Development (Northern Ireland) Order.
FRIDAY 2ND APRIL—Private Members' motions.
MONDAY 5TH APRIL—Supply [16th Allotted Day]: topic for debate to be announced.

Mrs. Thatcher: Does the right hon. Gentleman recollect that earlier in the week he anounced that the Second Reading of the Weights and Measures &c. Bill had been postponed for a reason which he gave as giving further time for further consultation? Will he give an undertaking that before the Bill is proceeded with, if it is to be proceeded with this Session, we shall have a debate in Government time as part of the process of consultation?

Mr. Short: I answered a question on this matter the other day and I said that we could not hold out any hope of giving a day for a pre-Second Reading debate. But we shall allow adequate time for consultation.

Mr. Golding: Has my right hon. Friend seen a report that the BBC is interested in broadcasting the Budget? Is he aware that many hon. Members support this idea, and will he tell the House his attitude?

Mr. Short: Yes, Sir, I have seen the Press report and I have been approached by a number of hon. Members on the matter. If there is a desire to broadcast the Budget, it could be done rather simply but only if the House approves the matter on a motion. If there is a general desire on this score, I shall undertake to table a motion.

Mr. Lawrence: In view of the recent figures showing an appalling increase in juvenile crime, will the right hon. Gentleman consider having an urgent debate on the conclusions of the Select Committee Report on the working of The Children and Young Persons Act which has now been before the House for almost a year?

Mr. Short: That is one of the matters which the House can debate when we come to discuss some of the Select Committee Reports.

Mr. Buchan: My right hon. Friend is aware of the anxieties and disquiet over

the EEC agricultural price package, particularly in regard to certain regulations that came before the House and were then withdrawn. Surely the time has come for Labour Members not to wait for the Opposition to do anything about the matter but to initiate a debate on the whole EEC price review so that these matters can be properly discussed and the views of the House made known to our Ministers.

Mr. Short: I have undertaken to find time for the two Orders mentioned by my right hon. Friend. There will be a resumed debate on that subject before Easter. As for a general debate on the settlement, I am afraid that I cannot give any time for that purpose. I pointed out to the House last week that in the last 20 years there have been five spring debates on this subject, each one of which was in Supply time.

Mr. Grylls: Has the right hon. Gentleman any news on the point I put to him last week about a debate in Government time on the draft NEB guidelines promised in reply to a point made last week by my hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Mailing (Mr. Stanley)? Since this is an urgent matter, could the right hon. Gentleman do something about the situation?

Mr. Short: I agree that I said something on this topic last week, and I shall try to find time to debate the guidelines.

Mr. Jay: If we do not have a debate next week on the EEC Order on skimmed milk powder, may we at least have that debate in the week afterwards? The Government's present attitude appears to be that they make decisions in Brussels with no regard to the opinions of this House.

Mr. Short: I do not accept the last words uttered by my right hon. Friend. I explained this matter carefully to the House a fortnight ago. What my right hon. Friend said is not correct. On the general point, I cannot promise time for a debate on this topic next week. I shall look at the situation in the week following. I shall undertake to find time to debate the matter before we rise for Easter.

Mr. Molyneaux: As there appears to be some degree of urgency over the Northern Ireland Order dealing with


social security and family allowances, will the right hon. Gentleman consider the possibility of dealing with those orders after Northern Ireland business on Thursday next?

Mr. Short: I shall examine the matter and let the hon. Gentleman know.

Mr. Ogden: Is my right hon. Friend aware of reports that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Energy does not intend to reappoint Sir Derek Ezra for a further term as Chairman of the National Coal Board? Is he aware that this is causing difficulty and anxiety in many parts of the coal industry? Will he urge my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Energy to come to the House as early as possible next week to refute these reports and to make a statement?

Mr. Short: I thought that my hon. Friend had been long enough in the House to know that he should not believe everything he reads in the Press.

Mr. Watt: Does the right hon. Gentleman recognise the need for an early debate on the future of the British fishing industry, in view of the negotiations on a common fishery policy and the Law of the Sea Conference? When shall we have a White Paper on this subject?

Mr. Short: I cannot say anything about a White Paper. I shall bear in mind the desire of hon. Members on both sides of the House for a debate on this subject. It is a matter that is causing concern to a good many Members.

Mr. Cormack: Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that it is time we debated the subject of Rhodesia? Is it not absurd that we should debate in the House matters of much less importance, when the whole of Southern Africa stands on the brink of what could be terrible disaster?

Mr. Short: I appreciate the concern of hon. Members in all parts of the House on this subject. I shall pass on the hon. Gentleman's comments to my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary.

Several hon. Members: Several hon. Members rose——

Mr. Speaker: The debate on Northern Ireland affairs is limited to seven o'clock.

I also have to consider a matter of privilege and a point of order. Therefore, I shall take only two more supplementary questions on the Business Statement.

Mr. Spearing: With reference to next week's two-day debate on direct elections to the European Assembly, is my right hon. Friend aware that yesterday the Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs refused to give an assurance that the draft convention on direct elections, which is to be considered by the Heads of State at the Summit, will be available for the debate? Will my right hon. Friend see to it, in the best interests of democracy, that that document is available to hon. Members and that we do not have only a precis of that document?

Mr. Short: I have before me what my right hon. Friend the Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs told the House yesterday. He said that it was not possible to have this document before us in the House. Usually the Government prepare a full precis which contains all the points. Such a document is being made available.

Mr. Tebbit: If the legislation on weights and measures cannot be brought before the House next week, will that legislation be brought back before the Summer Recess so that we shall know how long we shall have to go without consultation?

Mr. Short: I have said that there will be adequate time for consultation. I do not know how long it will take, but I repeat that there will be adequate time.

BRITISH TRANSPORT DOCKS (FELIXSTOWE) BILL

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Because of your appeal to the House, I shall make my points only in outline and write to you on the details. I do not necessarily ask you to rule on this matter today.
I wish to put to you, Mr. Speaker, the fact that last night there was a breach of Standing Order for Private Business No. 168 by reason of the fact that Clause 5 of the British Transport Docks (Felixstowe) Bill was not in italics,


although the Money Resolution clearly implied that Clause 5 authorised a withdrawal from the Consolidated Fund. That brings the matter within "Erskine May", page 736, line 18.
I also wish to draw your attention to the fact that Section 19(2)(c) of the Transport Act 1962 authorises Government loans
for acquiring an undertaking or part of an undertaking".
Paragraph (e) talks about
subscribing for or acquiring securities of a body corporate, otherwise than by way of investment".
Section 21(3) makes it clear that
Any sums required by the Treasury for fulfilling any guarantee under this section shall be charged on … the Consolidated Fund.
I shall endeavour to substantiate these points in more detailed written evidence.

Mr. Speaker: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman—he does not know how grateful—that he does not wish me to answer today. However, I shall seek to do so on Monday.

QUESTION OF PRIVILEGE

Mr. Skinner: I wish to raise with you, Mr. Speaker, a question arising out of the same debate to which reference has just been made—namely, the Second Reading of the British Transport Docks (Felixstowe) Bill. It was made abundantly clear on at least a couple of occasions, and on one occasion specifically by my hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Mr. Weetch), that European Ferries Limited had made a substantial offer to buy the shares of the Felixstowe port and had inserted within that offer an additional 15p on the basis that Members of Parliament would vote the Bill down.
I regard that as a breach of Privilege in the sense that the proposer of the offer, European Ferries Limited, was inducing Members of Parliament to vote in a certain way, and I suppose it could be argued that, if some of those Members had shares of their own, they could benefit themselves. References were made to Members of Parliament holding shares in the Felixstowe Company and having sold them on the basis of the offer.
The relevant paragraph in this offer document states:

Provided that the British Transport Docks (Felixstowe) Bill in its original or any modified form … currently before Parliament does not receive the Royal Assent, Ordinary Stockholders who accept the offer will be paid an additional amount of 15p in cash for each Ordinary Stock unit of Felixstowe Dock within 21 days of the Bill being withdrawn or otherwise lapsing.
I think that you, Mr. Speaker, will appreciate that, based on the vote last night, the Bill is still proceeding. But, as you know, it has now to go through a process of deliberation in Committee and in this House where it can still fall. On that basis, I think that the situation needs to be scrutinised by you.
As you will also appreciate, other breaches of Privilege have been raised in this House on the basis of certain statements made by various trade union leaders in both the recent and long past regarding the possible inducement of Members to vote in a certain way, and some of them have been established in a prima facie fashion for the Committee of Privileges to examine. Therefore, on that basis, I think that you should look at this offer document and consider whether a breach of Privilege has been caused as the result of its publication has been to influence Members of Parliament to vote in a certain way on a Bill before the House of Commons.

Mr. Speaker: I am obliged to the hon. Gentleman for the way in which he has presented his question of Privilege. I will, following precedent, give my ruling tomorrow.

Mr. Sedgemore: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I wonder whether, in view of the proceedings which took place yesterday on the British Transport Docks (Felixstowe) Bill, you could—not today, but on some future occasion—give the House some advice regarding the voting procedures on Private Bills.
Certain hon. Gentlemen opposite declared an interest—some declared a direct interest—in the Felixstowe Dock and Railway Company. If the voting lists are to be believed, some voted and others did not.
You will be aware, Mr. Speaker, that votes have been disallowed on Private Bills where hon. Members had sometimes an indirect and sometimes a direct interest. Indeed, if you think back to 20th May 1825, when this House was debating


the Leith Docks Bill—that is wholly appropriate to the subject of yesterday's debate—one Member who voted on that Bill said he had done so inadvertently, and his vote was subsequently expunged from the record. I could quote other cases, but in view of the time I will not do so.
As it appears that Private Bills are being whipped on both sides of the House and Members are therefore being encouraged to go into the Lobbies, it would seem appropriate that you should give some advice and guidance on the way in which Members should conduct themselves over these matters.

Mr. Speaker: It is dangerous for the occupant of the Chair to guide Members as to their conduct within the Division Lobbies, because the rules of the House are there for all right hon. and hon. Members to read. The facts are largely as the hon. Member stated them regarding 1825, when the vote was disallowed by the decision of the House because the vote of that particular Member was challenged immediately after the Division. In this instance, if there were a challenge, it should have been raised immediately after the Division last night. I will consider what the hon. Member said, but I doubt whether there will be much advantage in my making a further statement on the matter.

Mr. Ridley: Further to those two points of order, Mr. Speaker. We are in a dilemma. If the Bill did not pass, we understood, there might be benefit to shareholders in the Felixstowe Dock and Railway Company. On the other hand, if the Bill passed and in due course became law, there would be damage to all right hon. and hon. Members, because it would involve another sum of £5·28 million which would have to be raised in taxes. That would equally be a personal financial disadvantage to all hon. Members.

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman has long experience. I expect that

he has a point of order coming along, but he has not yet reached it.

Mr. Ridley: Surely it does not matter whether the pecuniary advantage is through having lower taxes or higher prices.

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman must not involve me in arguments between the two sides of the House. I shall be looking at the question of Privilege. I do not want to discuss anything related to it until I have considered it.

Mr. Buchan: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. You referred to the precedent of the 1825 Leith Docks Bill and the fact that the vote by one Member was challenged immediately after the vote. I do not understand the procedures prevailing in 1825, but I am aware of the procedures prevailing in 1976. We had no means of knowing who had or had not voted until the lists formally appeared in Hansard today. I ask you to keep that point in mind so that we do not accept the precedent as a total precedent but perhaps as a guide to action. This is the first occasion on which this matter could have been raised in this fashion.

Mr. Speaker: I understand that no challenge has been made against any particular Member. A general statement has been made.

Mr. Burden: Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. Is it not a fact that, unless Members had shares in the particular company and, therefore, if the Bill failed, would receive an extra 15p for every share they had, and that such Members voted in the Lobby against the Bill, the whole of this allegation would be completely destroyed?

Mr. Speaker: Order. The time has come to be fair to the Irish. Their debate will last only until seven o'clock. I will consider all the matters which have been raised.

NORTHERN IRELAND

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. John Ellis.]

4 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Merlyn Rees): On 5th March I told the House that direct rule in Northern Ireland would continue, that it would be positive and not negative— [Interruption.]

Mr. Russell Kerr: Mr. Russell Kerr (Feltham and Heston): On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. In view of the importance of this subject, will you please ask hon. Members to retire quietly?

Mr. Speaker: As usual, I am much obliged to the hon. Gentleman, who invariably draws attention to the fact that noise shows a lack of courtesy to the hon. Member who is addressing the House.

Mr. Rees: I was saying that on 5th March I told the House that direct rule in Northern Ireland would continue and that the Government would continue to discharge fully their responsibility for all aspects of affairs in Northern Ireland. It is, therefore, appropriate that the House should now be debating security and the economy, since these are two major problems to which the Government give overriding priority.
As regards security, the object of the Government's policy throughout has been to eradicate terrorism from Northern Ireland and from wherever it comes. The security forces are now bringing more and more people before the courts. That is much to be welcomed, but by itself this is insufficient. The terrorist will continue to exist as long as he has enough public support to provide him with a safe haven. But the terrorist can no longer be sure of this in Northern Ireland. The reason is clear. Increasingly, people know the terrorist for what he is in Northern Ireland. Experience has taught again and again that the rule of law is the rule of a stable society.
It is my strong view that the existence of detention not only estranged a part of the Northern Ireland community but also cast a shadow over the law itself. Now that no one is in detention, there is no doubt in my mind that in minority areas

there has been a change of attitude. This is reflected by the increased co-operation given to the security forces in dealing with terrorists. Progress is securely made only if it is in accordance with the rule of law. Some people affect to believe that if only the security forces could escape from political restraints they could soon, and expeditiously, deal with the terrorists. But there are no political restraints on the security forces in discharging their duty to catch terrorists and bring them before the courts.
Those who seek simplistic solutions to the security problem by what they call "war" on the terrorists display their own limited outlook—they seek to destroy society and the rule of law in order to save it. This is no solution to terrorism. It plays into the terrorists' hands, and we cannot ignore the lesson of Irish history. Although I consider it essential that we should operate through the law, it does not mean, however, that the law itself is immutable. Indeed, we are constantly considering whether we can make improvements. The House will recall that a number of offences were created by the Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) (Amendment) Act 1975 following the report of the Gardiner Committee. The important thing is that the law as changed should be fair and just and should be accepted as such.
There are many difficulties in changing the law and in making it more effective to deal with problems of terrorism. The Gardiner Committee recommended a new offence of terrorism, but, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General said in winding up the debate on Second Reading of the Emergency Provisions Bill last June, we felt that it was better to make individual offences as clear and specific as possible, and new offences of recruiting to an illegal organisation and of training others in arms and explosives were introduced.
I have several times explained to the House the difficulties in prosecuting for membership of a proscribed organisation. If I were to believe the stories, the rumours perhaps, of people in Northern Ireland who are members of proscribed organisations and if I were to put them in a list, the list would be very long. But rumour and innuendo are not enough. At the time of the Ulster workers' strike, there were those who said that certain well-known people were


members of proscribed organisations or at least of para-military organisations. I do not know, and it is not enough to believe rumours. The fact has to be proved in the courts. Otherwise one is failing in arguing to people that the rule of law is what matters.
It has been urged upon the Government that they should adopt a provision similar to that operating in the Irish Republic under which prosecutions can rest on a declaration by a chief superintendent of the Garda that to the best of his belief a man is a member of the IRA. I understand why this provision can be used in the Republic, but to translate it to Northern Ireland, where there is a divided community, would not be acceptable and it would set back the acceptability of the police throughout the community which, above all, is important in pursuing terrorism.
I mention these as some of the difficulties, but we continue to seek ways in which, by changes in the law, the actions of the security forces in dealing with terrorism can be assisted. I shall not hesitate to bring fresh legislation before the House to this end as solutions are found. The House will know that the Report of the Law Commission on Conspiracy and Criminal Law Reform was published on Tuesday last. With my colleagues I am studying the Report and will pay particular regard to its application in Northern Ireland in our continuing studies.
The problem always facing the Government is the sometimes wilful ignorance of some people in Northern Ireland on what is being achieved in the security sector. We give this information to Northern Ireland on a weekly basis and quarterly statistics are placed in the House of Commons Library. A right hon. Gentleman raised last week the question of a better way of providing the figures, or at least of presenting them, and we are looking at that. In addition, we have mounted a campaign in the Northern Ireland Press to give factual information. I give now an example: "The Fight Against Crime" with figures, on a four-page basis, which we publish from time to time in Northern Ireland.
I spend a great deal of my time visiting 'the police and Army on the ground, as no doubt my predecessors and Ministers

who worked for them did. They get very tired of politically-motivated criticisms of their activities. It is the successes of the Royal Ulster Constabulary and the Army, aided by the significantly growing number of people who now voluntarily help and give information to the police, that provide hope for the future.
In 1974, 1,073 persons were convicted of scheduled offences. In 1975 the figure was 1,090. These were the totals of people convicted during those years. I must point out that the offences may well have been committed at an earlier period. At present, 900 people charged with serious offences are awaiting trial. I ask the House to translate these figures by multiplying them by 35 to get the figures as they would apply in Great Britain. So far this year 274 persons have been charged with terrorist-type offences, including 45 charged with murder or attempted murder. That is remarkably successful, and I want to pay tribute to all who played a part in arresting and charging these people.
So far this year, no fewer than 66 persons have been charged with firearms offences and 63 with explosives offences. Since the beginning of the year, the security forces have found or neutralised over 15,000 lb. of explosives. To achieve that, there was a great deal of spadework to be done in the weeks and months before, and 156 weapons have been recovered. How many lives have these successes of the security forces saved?
Do those remarkable figures indicate inactivity by the security forces? Do they support the shameful allegations that for some incomprehensible political reason the Government are restraining the security forces in Northern Ireland? They do not. The success rate in recovering explosives in the past few months is remarkable, but we hear only too little of these successes and, worse, we are sometimes told that the security forces are deliberately inactive.

Mr. Gerard Fitt: Now that my right hon. Friend is talking about the success story of the security forces, will he confirm or rebut the serious allegations made in Northern Ireland by prominent members of the legal profession in the last two or three days? My right hon. Friend is correct to say that the figures are given in a weekly bulletin


from Stormont Castle, but people have now cast doubt on their veracity. They say that the police in Northern Ireland, probably through the Director of Public Prosecutions or some other agency, are originally charging people with murder but that after an incarceration of six or nine months or longer the charges are dropped, and that the figures which my right hon. Friend has given today are not accurate. This causes great concern in Northern Ireland, and I hope that he will take this opportunity to state the true position.

Mr. Rees: The figures of convictions in the courts which I gave are one part of the story, and it is my responsibility to give such figures. The Attorney-General will be dealing with this point later. The bringing of charges is a matter for the police and not for me. I do not get involved at all. The bringing of prosecutions is a matter for the Director of Public Prosecutions and not for me. The finding of an accused guilty or not guilty is a matter for the courts and not for me. I steer clear in every way of all these processes. That is what is meant by the rule of law. But my right hon and learned Friend will seek to answer the precise point later.
Then there are the people who drive across parts of the Province and allege that they see no soldiers. The GOC deploys his soldiers for operational and not presentational reasons, and I fully support him. Other than asking a question, I would not ever determine where the soldiers should be deployed. In 1975 there were 4,903,878 searches of vehicles —nearly 5 million—at all hours of the day and night by the police and the Army. Many of the soldiers are from my own constituency. There were 30,092 house searches. A total of 377 travelling gunmen were charged in 1975. That is 377 guns on the move, and God knows who might have been injured or killed if they had reached their destination. Can anyone justifiably say that not enough is being done?
As I have said, it is for the GOC to decide how to deploy his troops, and it would not be in the public interest to disclose details. Discussion of troop movements is to the advantage only of those against whom the soldiers are working. In my view also, the movement of troops is discussed too openly in

Northern Ireland. Those whom we are trying to apprehend can read, watch the television and listen to the radio.
Despite the continued success of the security forces, terrible incidents continue to occur in Northern Ireland. To illustrate the effectiveness of the police and the Army, let me give a few examples. Two men have just been gaoled for life for the murder of 19-year-old William Hardy who was kidnapped and shot in the head last September. I understand—I use that phrase deliberately because I am not involved—that two men have been charged with the murder of an electricity worker by a booby-trap bomb in Belfast on 27th February, about which the unions concerned came to talk to us at Stormont Castle when we discussed their problems in this area. I also understand that three men have been charged with the murders of three women in a house on the outskirts of Belfast on 15th February.
The Government will do everything they can to assist the people of Northern Ireland to uphold the rule of law through the Army and the police. We continue to promote co-operation with the Government of the Republic, who have themselves had conspicuous success this year in dealing with terrorists.

Mr. John Carson: I support all that the right hon. Gentleman has said about detections, especially around Belfast. I have dissociated myself from those who would cast any slur on the security forces or the police. Can the right hon. Gentleman give us any details about the 25 people who, he has said, are in South Armagh and terrorising the area? How many, if any, of these men have been arrested? What security work is being done to arrest these 25 vicious men?

Mr. Rees: What I did not say was that they were in South Armagh. I said that they were the people involved. It is difficult to give details when they have not yet been apprehended, because that is a matter for the police and the Army. Terrorists must be concerned at the recovery of explosives by the two Governments. We recovered five tons in 1975 and have already recovered more than five tons in 1976. I understand that about seven tons of explosives has recently been found in the South, a good deal of it in transit to the North.
But successes against the terrorists are only a means to an end—the restoration of law and order in Northern Ireland, to which we must look forward. That is why I and ministerial colleagues in other Departments—as I said some weeks ago in a letter to the Chairman of the Convention—are now examining the action and resources required for the next few years to maintain law and order, how best to achieve the primacy of the police, the size and the rôle of locally-recruited forces and the progressive reduction of the Armed Forces as soon as it is safely practicable. The establishment of the RUC is now 6,500, and with a strength of 5,000 there is no immediate restraint on recruiting.
It is only in the context of the effectiveness of the police that we can talk about a reduction of the Army, but I want to make it clear that it is the Government's determination to keep the Army in Northern Ireland as long as necessary. The defence review does not affect that determination: it is a priority. We are re-examining the establishment figure of the RUC with the Police Authority.
I am also examining the role of the Police Authority, without prejudice to its plan for new appointments when existing appointments expire in June. This is all part and parcel of the Government's desire to restore the primacy of the police in Northern Ireland. Since the publication in 1974 of the White Paper, which included a section on law and order, we have progressed steadily with this difficult task. Since my announcement of the extension of policing in September of that year, the RUC has increased by 500 and the RUC Reserve by over 2,000.
There are other factors which have contributed to the restoration of law and order—the release of all detainees, the ending of special-category status for those committing offences after 1st March, the realisation that there will be no amnesty and the knowledge that those who commit crimes will be taken through the courts. Those factors show the Government's resolve. They are all aspects of the Government's concern that normality should return to Northern Ireland.
The Chief Constable is subject to no one on operational matters. The courts are independent and, as I have said, the Northern Ireland Director of Public

Prosecutions has statutory responsibility for prosecutions in the Province. It does not rest with me. That is all as it should be.
The other major problem which must have overriding priority is the management of the economy.

Mr. James Kilfedder: Before he leaves the question of security, perhaps the right hon. Gentleman had better realise that his words offer no comfort to the people of Northern Ireland, because they have had seven years of violence and they see seven more years of violence ahead of them. What would the Secretary of State say to a policeman who said to me that the youngsters who were throwing stones at him in 1969 were now breeding a new generation of delinquents? What hope is there for the people of Northern Ireland?

Mr. Rees: Of course there is a problem for both communities, the Protestant as much as the Catholic, but, whether on the political or the security side, to believe that there is some simple solution, that, abracadabra, things can be put right is the great error that is made on the Irish question and has been made over a long period. I strongly believe that we are on the right road, but it would be nonsense to believe that there is a solution just around the corner, the week after next. It arises from the nature of the society, which the hon. Gentleman knows from his long experience in Northern Ireland and from his birth in the Republic. Those are things that have to work themselves out, and we are all in it together. There is, however, one thing that needs to be done: the security forces can make errors, as we all do, but in general they need praise for what they are doing.
The economy is the other major problem. The House is familiar with the nature of the economic problems. I shall mention only one figure, that for unemployment. The number of unemployed in Northern Ireland now stands above 50,000. About one in 10 of the work force is out of work. There are some parts of the Province where the figures are three times as bad, and even worse. The relative differences are not new, but the total figure is something that has developed recently. This is not a new situation in Northern Ireland. It has


been going on for decades. It arises out of something basic in the Province —the distance of the water gap between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom.

Rev. Ian Paisley: Can the right hon. Gentleman help us in connection with the report on transport which has recently been published? Can he say a little about what he is going to do to implement it?

Mr. Rees: It was presented to the Economic Council and a copy is now in the Library. I arranged at the time for it to be sent to all hon. Members. I thought it was the right thing, as part and parcel of more open government, that documents should not simply come to me but should be discussed, and we are asking for comments. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State confirms that this has been done.
My right hon. Friend, who has involved himself in this matter through the Department of Commerce and the Department of Manpower Services—two excellent Departments of Government in Northern Ireland—will have more to say on the economy at the end of the debate, if he is left time to do so. This, however, I will say. The strict operation of market forces would lead to very great economic problems in Northern Ireland, much greater than they are now. I had not realised that the involvement of Government in the economy was at the high level it is in Northern Ireland.
Naturally, Northern Ireland has to play its part in the Government's economic strategy. Within that broad requirement, the Government's public expenditure plans are by no means ungenerous to Northern Ireland. My colleagues in the Cabinet have been very helpful. Over the next five years, the broad picture for Northern Ireland is not that there will be severe retrenchment in public expenditure but rather that expenditure will level off. There is still provision for growth in the programmes of the greatest social and economic significance, deliberately made by the Government. Housing, health and personal social services, education and industrial development are the priorities which we felt were right for Northern Ireland.
What is important is that in all major programmes except roads—we felt that

the Province had done rather well for roads over a period of time and that it was genuinely time for a cut-back—and environmental services, as a reflection of the greater need, public expenditure per head in Northern Ireland will be significantly higher throughout the five years of the planning period than it will be in Great Britain as a whole. That was the case in different circumstances under the previous Administration. We have carried it on in different circumstances, and in my view this is the answer to people who claim to see evidence of the Government's intention to withdraw economically from Northern Ireland.
That is not the case. Every time there is a problem, the fact that it may not be dealt with is not an example of pulling out. In my view—and this is a philosophy which transcends Northern Ireland—it is not that problems end but rather that the nature of problems changes. This is the case in Northern Ireland, as it is anywhere else.
The House will shortly be considering a proposed Order in Council the main purpose of which will be to establish the Northern Ireland Development Agency. We shall also be examining the structure of the Economic Council to see whether it can be reorganised in a way which will enable it to play an even bigger role in the economic life of the country. There is general agreement that it does not do that at the moment.
Because of the severity of the economic problems now facing Northern Ireland, we have decided on a wide-ranging review of economic and industrial strategy. The House was told about this in an answer which I gave to a Question last week. We do not expect to find any panacea, but we must take the measure of the problems and see whether the existing ways of dealing with them are adequate. Was the strategy as laid down five, six, seven or eight years ago in the various reports the right one? Should there be more help to small firms, and especially concerning the movement into one sector as opposed to another? The asking of questions and wide discussion are what my right hon. Friend is seeking.
I have spoken so far about two of the key problems that we face in Northern


Ireland: security and the economy. In the last few minutes of my speech, however, I should like to put a slightly wider view. It is a view which I have put before this House consistently. The responsibility for Northern Ireland rests with the Government and with this House, and with nobody else. It is part of the United Kingdom. The problems which I have talked about are part of what is meant by direct rule. I could have talked about other aspects of it—for example, about the important work done by the Ministers and the civil servants working for the Department of Health and Social Services or the Department of Education. These, too, are a part of direct rule. There is no question of there being a vacuum.
My own belief is that the recent public opinion polls which indicate that a very large number of people in Northern Ireland accept with equanimity and even approval the idea of continued direct rule are not too far off the mark. [Interruption.] There is disagreement on the other side of the House. It may be for different reasons that both sides of the community want direct rule. I am not arguing that that is the end product of our policy; I am talking about the short run.
The same polls, if they are right, show a worrying increase in the number of people who are prepared to accept the use of violence to further political aims. To the extent that there is truth in this, we must continue and increase our efforts on the security front, and to this end I shall be renewing in the course of the summer the Emergency Provisions Act. The House should know that I have not hesitated to make full use of the powers available to me under the Prevention of Terrorism Act, which is a United Kingdom Act, as opposed to the Emergency Provisions Act, which applies only to Northern Ireland. There has been increasing use of it in recent weeks. I shall also renew the direct rule legislation.
We shall also be putting our minds to the difficult problem of handling legislation for Northern Ireland, and there are problems there. But I want to make it clear that the responsibility of the House for Northern Ireland clearly rests with me and my Ministers. Above all, what we need to do is to concentrate upon

giving Northern Ireland good, fair and firm government.

Mr. Kilfedder: Let us hope we get it.

Mr. Rees: We shall get it as long as the hon. Gentleman is not around. Indeed, the hon. Gentleman exemplifies the problems we have in Northern Ireland—all noise, and no putting forward of positive solutions. He exemplifies the real problem we face, and for that reason I shall not give way to him at the moment because I have heard it all before.

Mr. Kilfedder: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Is it right for the right hon. Gentleman to throw out an insult to another Member and then not have the decency to give way?

Mr. Rees: I could hand out a great deal more, because the hon. Gentleman does not play a constructive part in Northern Ireland, even though that is what we need. It comes from other hon. Members here, but not from the hon. Gentleman, who is all something and wind.
There are no easy solutions to the problem of Northern Ireland. The beginning of wisdom in Northern Ireland affairs is to accept that. Our task and responsibility must be to govern, and this we shall do. To share our ideas on security and the economic situation is an important part of that process—for those hon. Members who can understand it.

4.30 p.m.

Mr. Airey Neave: Everyone concerned with Northern Ireland will be glad that we are having this debate, which I hope will be constructive, though it will be rather short.
As the Secretary of State said, there is no instant solution. Security and the economy are the main issues. We have been looking forward to hearing the right hon. Gentleman tell the House what he meant by "positive" direct rule, and he has given us food for thought and material to consider today. I hope that he will agree that such rule should be not only "positive" but "sensitive" to local feelings. Whatever the polls may say, the growth of the Civil Service and administrative action under direct rule in Northern Ireland raise the question of how local opinion will be consulted. Some people do not agree, but the question may well arise in the next few months.
The right hon. Gentleman has told me in answer to a Question that there are many advisory committees in Northern Ireland. We must wait and see whether that answer suffices and whether it is true that there is no political vacuum. It will be some months before we find out. In the meantime, the House remains the sole method of scrutiny of direct rule.
I do not intend to pursue the question of the political situation now, for direct rule demands that the Government turn all their attention to security and the worsening economic plight of Northern Ireland.
The security forces have achieved a great deal by their courage and efficiency. From time to time we have criticised political decisions affecting the security forces, especially before the recent measures in South Armagh were announced. But we have not cast doubts on their perseverance and skill. No one on this side of the House has charged them with inactivity, but they need further backing from the law to bring the criminals to justice, That is the Government's responsibility, and an Opposition are entitled to make these points.
In the Second Reading debate on the Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) (Amendment) Bill last year I said:
The first duty of a democratic Government is to protect the lives of their citizens and allow them to go about their legitimate business in peace."—[Official Report, 27th June 1975; Vol. 894, c. 915.]
That has been said often before in the House, but it is particularly important now, and the right hon. Gentleman is right to say that the rule of law is what matters. We shall continue to support all measures to that end.
I turn to the security situation in South Armagh, which seems to have improved since the announcement on 12th January, which we discussed, and the declaration of a special emergency area. The deployment of Special Air Service and other troops in the area seems to have had a deterrent effect on the people there who are regarded as responsible for some dreadful massacres. They seem to have been driven out of that area, and the security forces should receive the congratulations of the House on that excellent result. Predictably, those concerned have switched their operations to other parts of the Province, underlining yet

again the importance of never relaxing alertness in one area when the spotlights are on another.

Rev. Ian Paisley: It comes as some surprise to Members on this bench that the hon. Gentleman feels that the position in South Armagh is something on which we can congratulate ourselves. We appreciate all that the army and police are doing, but has the hon. Gentleman any concrete evidence that the vicious gunmen and bomb-layers who have been operating in South Armagh are operating elsewhere? If he looks at the facts he will find that there have been some attempts on lives which fortunately did not take lives but which could have resulted in some of the most serious massacres of Army personnel.

Mr. Neave: Any improvement in the situation is welcome. Our impression is that the presence of the Special Air Service in South Armagh and the increased number of troops has had a considerable impact not only on local opinion but on the presence of the terrorists involved.

Mr. Merlyn Rees: What worries me about the discussion which has quite properly developed is that sometimes people act to prove that what we say is wrong. There is a great improvement, but the situation is not solved. I appreciate that the hon. Gentleman was not saying that. I intervene only because it is sometimes dangerous to preen ourselves about such areas.

Mr. Neave: I was not seeking to say that the situation was solved. That is far from being the case. But I was congratulating the security forces on what I believe, from what I have heard, to be an improvement.
We have seen renewed bombing and destruction in Belfast and other towns and the continuation of sectarian murder. There were the explosions in January and February, and there have been 89 deaths in the first 12 weeks of the year. Those facts can be cause for little satisfaction. I am not suggesting that the matter has been solved, but I am saying that the measures announced on 12th January, which received the support of this side of the House, have at any rate brought about an improvement.
I should like to ask the right hon. Gentleman more about the basis on which the Government operate their security programme. He should tell us more than he has told us at Question Time about the so-called cease-fire and talks with representatives of the political wings of paramilitary organisations. I asked him to do that last Thursday, when he repeated a previous formula that I find a little ambiguous. The right hon. Gentleman always says "It was not our cease-fire. It was an expression by the IRA." He seems to recognise that there is a cease-fire, and to some extent he has defended it.
Does the right hon. Gentleman still operate from the standpoint that a genuine cease-fire exists in Northern Ireland? How does it affect the security forces? Whatever it did, the cease-fire did not reduce violence. It only changed its nature. It would be much better if the position were made clear to the public, who do not understand what is meant by the definition of a cease-fire which apparently is only an "expression" by one side in the struggle and which has not reduced violence.
I speak for many of my hon. Friends when I say that we fail to see any advantage to be gained by talks with the Provisional Sinn Fein. The right hon. Gentleman told us on Thursday that he thought they would do no harm. He said that talking to political wings was not negotiation. I was glad to hear him say that, but he will agree that the IRA is clearly committed to a renewed campaign in Britain and Northern Ireland. It is the Government's responsibility to meet it and defeat it. What worries us is that so long as the so-called talks continue, the public here and in Northern Ireland will understandably doubt the determination to win. It may not be fair, but that is how people think.
The IRA has no negotiable objectives. Even if it had, it should not be allowed to gain them by murder and destruction. Therefore, we are entitled to continue to ask why political wings of any paramilitary organisation—I am not referring only to the IRA—should have available the time and talents of a number of senior civil servants to explain matters the explanations of which, the

Secretary of State said on 18th March, are already available in Hansard. Perhaps providing a regular supply of copies of Hansard to their headquarters would be one way to deal with the matter. It would be cheaper and less damaging to public morale and the Government's standing.
I hope that the Secretary of State will reconsider his attitude to the question of talks. I am not accusing him of negotiation, but I do not believe that the talks are doing any good, for the reasons I have just given.
The security forces have a most unenviable task, not only to reduce and bring to an end terrorism and violence, but to pursue those who have committed serious crimes over a number of years and to bring them to justice. The Government must provide those forces with adequate powers under the law to bring the culprits to justice and to remove them from circulation.
The Secretary of State congratulated himself and his colleagues on ending detention despite a massive upsurge in violence last autumn. We criticised that decision. I will not pursue that now, but what did we get in the place of detention? The Secretary of State defended his decision on the ground that more convictions were being achieved in the courts and rightly stressed his determination to depend on court procedures. We must examine the present procedures and consider whether they can be amended and improved, as the Secretary of State has said he intends, to assist the security forces.
In an answer from the Secretary of State to the hon. Member for Londonderry (Mr. Ross) on 12th January, we were given at least one reason why more convictions do not succeed. I congratulate all those concerned with the number of convictions, but, as the Secretary of State said in his Answer, there were 127 kneecappings or punishment shootings in 1973 and 187 in 1975. This shows that violent and ruthless men mean to maintain a rule of terror in which no one will dare to give evidence against them.
Intimidation of witnesses was one of the reasons for the introduction of detention as the Gardiner Report pointed out, and it does not seem to have decreased. If we are not using detention, we must examine ways of giving witnesses more


protection. Are the Government satisfied that all possible protection is given to witnesses? Is the study group at Stormont considering proposals made by some Northern Ireland parties on this matter?

Mr. Merlyn Rees: There is no study group in Northern Ireland. In talking about the primacy of the police, I have mentioned a study group. Ministers are looking into this matter, but this is quite separate and not on all fours with the primacy of the police.

Mr. Neave: The Secretary of State says that these matters are being considered by Ministers, and I am glad to hear that. I hope they will bear the problem of intimidation very much in mind.
I hope they will also consider the adequacy of the law on incitement and the case of Mr. Kevin Agney, who made remarks amounting to threats. I understand that it has been decided—and I do not criticise those responsible for this decision—that no prosecution could be sustained. People are naturally asking why not and questioning whether the law should be changed.
The Secretary of State will remember an amendment moved from his side of the House to the emergency powers legislation last summer aimed at making incitement to terrorism a specific criminal offence. I hope that Ministers are examining that suggestion along with the other matters which I have raised.
The need for a new legal solution for dealing with membership of these organisations is also involved here. The ability of Martin MacGuinness to avoid prosecution in Northern Ireland at the present time makes it essential that this matter should be studied. We welcome the ministerial action in these matters and look forward to an early statement in the House.
The Secretary of State will remember that on the Second Reading of the Emergency Provisions (Amendment) Bill, a number of hon. Members pressed him on the matter of a general offence of terrorism as recommended in paragraphs 70 and 71 of the Gardiner Report. At that time he rejected the idea but I hope that he will reconsider it. If newspaper

reports are to be believed, he is already doing so. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Sir M. Havers) will have more to say on these important legal problems later.
Before I leave security, I should like to make one other suggestion. Should the Secretary of State not consider the possibility of raising a full-time company in each UDR Battalion? This has been suggested by various people, and my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Mr. Goodhart) raised the matter at Question Time last week, when the Secretary of State said that it was being "looked at". Will he give us some information fairly soon on how seriously it is being looked at and when an announcement may be expected? The UDR does invaluable work in assisting the security forces and has the important asset of local knowledge and experience.
May I remind the Secretary of State that more than nine months ago he said:
If the cease-fire were to end, and terrorism and intimidation were once again to reach the horrifying levels of the past, there must be provisions for removing evil killers from the streets".—[Official Report, 27th June 1975; Vol. 894, c. 886.]
We agree with those sentiments. We feel that, by one means or another, these people must be dealt with and removed from the streets. We shall give the Government all possible support in any measures to strengthen the law which are likely to achieve that end.
The economic situation is pretty gloomy. I asked during the debate on the Appropriation Order whether the Government were studying the structure of investment centres in Northern Ireland and I understand that the Minister of State is writing to me on this subject. It is important that this structure should be to the benefit of new industries to prolong their operations rather than being able to maximise the incentives at the beginning of the operation. I understand that we shall shortly be hearing the Government's plans for the new Northern Ireland Development Corporation and how much capital it is planned to make available to it.
The unemployment situation worries everybody concerned with Northern Ireland and I understand that the total is now 47 per cent. higher than in March


last year. The loss of jobs in engineering has been increased by the announcement of defence cuts, which we debated on Monday, and has led to what the Secretary of State has described as the fear of "economic withdrawal."
We were glad to hear what he said on that subject today. He cannot repeat often enough that this is not the Government's policy. We believe that the fears are unjustified, but it would be a help if the Minister of State would repeat the assurances in his winding-up speech and also stress that any story of "economic sanctions" being imposed against Northern Ireland to achieve a political objective are incorrect. This type of rumour should be stopped as quickly as possible.
The real needs of the people of Northern Ireland, exacerbated as they are by terrorism, must be the basis of economic policy. We welcome the review announced by the Economic Council. It is important for people to feel that positive policies are being pushed forward. The Minister of State's statement that the Government desire to create a new confidence in the Province as an area of industrial opportunity is welcome and bears repetition.
On no account must this House ever fail to show confidence and hope to the people of Northern Ireland. We must never despair. In the long run, this confidence can come about only by restoring the law. That is the key to stability and constitutional advance.

4.48 p.m.

Mr. John Watkinson: It was with interest that I heard the opening remarks of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State because he pinpointed one of the terrible dilemmas constantly facing anyone who concerns himself with Northern Ireland politics— the right of the State to protect itself and its citizens. My right hon. Friend mentioned that he had ended detention, and he knows that he had the full backing of hon. Members on this side for that decision. If we are determined to reestablish the rule of law in Northern Ireland, the preservation of a system of detention, internment or imprisonment without fair trial could not but undermine the basis of the free and lawful

society that we are trying to recreate there.
From communications with relatives in Northern Ireland, I am well aware of the terror which the people there have to face. I am also aware of the intimidation of witnesses. But, in considering how to protect society and to what extent society should seek extraordinary measures outside the rule of law, we must take account of the impact of those measures. As my right hon. Friend said, detention was counter-productive. It fostered alienation in the minority communities in Northern Ireland, and my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, West (Mr. Fitt) could give the House many examples.
My right hon. Friend deserves congratulations on his singularly brave decision to end internment without trial. As he rightly said, and as we must concede, there may be circumstances in which a society has to seek extraordinary measures to protect itself. In my judgment those measures were not necessary in Northern Ireland because they were politically counter-productive. We may talk about security and the economy, but we are always driven back to politics.
My right hon. Friend said that the security troops in Northern Ireland were operating effectively, and he gave statistics. The security problem cannot be solved given the circumstances in which Parliament has to operate. There are limits upon the operational facilities we can extend to the Army. If we lived in a totalitarian society, the rule of terror in Northern Ireland might well be ended within a few weeks or a few months because we could use counter-terror against terror. I do not say that we could stamp out terror, but the use of counter-terror could well produce a significant reduction; but against that we should note that in some countries with totalitarian régimes—for example, Spain —the use of terror against terror has not operated effectively.
My right hon. Friend said that we should multiply the statistics which he gave by 35 to get a comparable figure for a similar performance in the United Kingdom. He said that 900 people were awaiting trial. If we multiply that figure by 35 we get the alarming result of approximately 31,500 awaiting trial in this country. That is a devastating indictment of the operation of legal services in


Northern Ireland, and that is a disturbing aspect.
When we debate Northern Ireland we are always driven back to politics. After the failure of the Convention, my right hon. Friend was logically driven to the imposition of direct rule, and that move may have surprisingly beneficial consequences for Northern Ireland. The minority community feel protected to the extent that they are not under Protestant rule in so far as rule comes from this place and the Northern Irish Protestants may welcome the present arrangement because it satisfies their loyalist tendencies, their desire to remain part of the United Kingdom.
One dilemma which concerns the House and the nation and which will not go away is the meaning of democracy in Northern Ireland. Whatever electoral procedure is adopted, elections in Northern Ireland always produce a majority for the Unionists. We believe in the principle of democracy, in the right of people to go to the polls and express their opinion, and that expression is carried through to the formation of a government. But the people of Northern Ire land who have voted under every conceivable system still come up with a solution which has proved unacceptable. That conflicts with another facet of the workings of this place and the society in which we live, namely, the tendency of the British people always to seek the com promise solution. That is one reason why we have consistently maintained that there must be power sharing in Northern Ireland. In Rhodesia we say that there must be majority rule, but we will not allow majority rule in Northern Ireland——

Mr. Fitt: At the time of the creation of the Northern Ireland State, which takes in the six counties in the North, a head count showed a 55 per cent. Protestant majority and a 35 per cent. Catholic minority. That cannot be compared with the democratic concept as it applies to this House. For 50 years there was one-party government. There never was a possibility that the alternative Opposition could become the Government at the next election. We cannot equate what happens at Westminster with what happens in Northern Ireland.

Mr. Watkinson: I accept what my hon. Friend says. It adds to the weight of my argument. I support my right hon. Friend's view that the only solution is a system of power sharing. I support that policy because there are divisions in the society. How can these divisions be brought together so that we can solve the problem of terrorists and the IRA?
When the British people confront a body such as the IRA or an extreme terrorist organisation their response is to draw together, to combine and to produce a coalition That is a sensible solution in the long term for Northern Ireland if the people wish to defeat the IRA. I believe it to be in the long-term interest of Northern Ireland that it should rule itself, and the only way that can be done is through a system of power sharing.
I said that in the short term direct rule may have beneficial effects, but the whole history of the Province has been that the people have sought independence and wished to control and govern themselves. That urge will re-establish itself. The people of Northern Ireland wish to govern themselves. As they see devolution created in other parts of the United Kingdom, they will demand it for themselves, and they are entitled to do that. I agree that it is necesary in the longer term to think about a devolved system of government.
The consequences of direct rule are such that we in this country are in the front line. We now have to accept that the attacks could occur in the middle of London. Which of us can travel on the London Underground without realising the devastating consequences of a bomb explosion? I ask Ulster Unionists—what will be the consequences upon the Government of a series of bomb explosions here? We are looking to Ulster Unionists for new initiatives to produce the devolved system of Government which I would like to see. I look forward to hearing from them about movements in their political thought since the imposition of direct rule. What is their response to that? Have they any proposals to bring forward a system of devolved government which we wish to see? They have a direct responsibility unless they wish to continue under direct rule. It is their responsibility to come forward now


with proposals for some system of devolved government.
All the studies of the economic situation in Northern Ireland have shown that, historically, the economy has stood up well, given the awful circumstances which have prevailed. But there is evidence now that the continuation of terrorism is having an effect on the level of investment in Northern Ireland and on the willingness of firms to go there. Virtually no funds have come recently from the United States to provide jobs. New investment funds are vital.
The problems of the Northern Ireland economy date back to a period before the troubles. Northern Ireland has had to rely upon the basic, stable industries which are in decline in all parts of the United Kingdom. One has only to consider the position of the shipbuilding industry in this country and in Northern Ireland to realise the grave employment situation.
It is self-evident that if there is to be reinvestment and a regeneration of industry in Northern Ireland, a cessation of violence is vital. Some form of political solution must be found which can produce the climate to encourage investment and to persuade foreign firms to provide jobs for the people of Northern Ireland and Britain. There is a reluctance to do that. There must be a political solution to provide us with the platform whereby the economic solutions to the problems of Northern Ireland can be found.

5.5 p.m.

Mr. McCusker: In a debate on employment an hon. Member, referring to the statistics which had just been published, said:
The mid-July figure is 514,000…. If the figure for Northern Ireland of 36,000 is added, the total is 550,000, which is the highest figure since the July, 1940 … The percentage for the country is 2·2. For Northern Ireland it is 7·1 per cent., a scandalously high level which should not be tolerated by any Government. The situation is very distressing."—[Official Report, 24th July 1968, Vol. 769, c. 787–8.]
Who said that? Who said that 7·1 per cent. unemployment was a scandalously high level? It was the Minister of State who is now responsible for employment in Northern Ireland and under whose régime unemployment has risen to

50,000. What does he say now? He should be chastened. He said:
I say with some humility that it is a difficult time for Ministers who have a responsibility for Northern Ireland.
and later:
Of course an unemployment rate of 11·1 per cent. is unacceptable."—[Official Report, 22nd March 1976; Vol. 908, c. 152–4.]
I am sure that when the right hon. Gentleman said that the figures should not be tolerated by the Government he was referring not only to the Unionist Government of Northern Ireland but to a Labour Government. The present figures should not be washed away as simply "unacceptable". I prefer the words which he used eight years ago. Today's figures are 60 per cent. higher than in 1968. They are not just very distressing but potentially disastrous. The people of Northern Ireland are today watching 25 years of industrial achievement crumbling before their eyes.

The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. Stanley Orme): The hon. Member for Armagh (Mr. McCusker) quoted me correctly. I do not retract either of those statements. While the hon. Member can rightly press the Government in the House on its policies and ask what is to be done, he should also address himself to his own people in Northern Ireland. He is aware of the violence which has helped to create the present situation and which has hindered the Government. He will be aware of the Ulster workers' strike and the damage which that did to investment. The hon. Gentleman should look at the picture in the round.

Mr. McCusker: The people of Northern Ireland are watching 25 years of industrial achievement crumbling before their eyes. Graigavon and Antrim, new town developments based on industrial expansion, have become bad dreams. We cannot run away from it.
I was born in a traditional textile town, like many hon. Members opposite, where when one got up in the morning one could tell the time by the tone of different horns as they sounded. By the early 1950s those horns were all but silenced and the linen industry almost dead. At that time there were not many employment opportunities in Northern Ireland but by the late 1950s to the early


1960s the Northern Ireland Government were beginning to achieve things. Our engineering base was widened, traditional textiles were being replaced by synthetic textiles, international companies were being attracted, new jobs were being created at the rate of 7,000 to 8,000 a year, Government training centres were springing up—Northern Ireland has ten times more training places than Great Britain—and apprenticeship opportunities were raised from 16 per cent to 40 per cent.
This was not all in 1970, 1971, 1972 or 1973, as the Minister appears to imply. As late as June 1974, there were only 25,000 unemployed in Northern Ireland. In the same year, an article in the Financial Times said:
There is an amazing paradox in Northern Ireland. On the one hand, urban war flares up from time to time on the streets of the Province. But on the other, Ulster's industry is humming, with the highest productivity and lowest absenteeism in the whole of the United Kingdom.
Northern Ireland was one of the success stories of United Kingdom regional policy. Since the war, more than 75,000 jobs have been created and 300 new industries had been attracted to the Province. It was not easy. It had to be done in the face of almost insurmountable obstacles, but it was achieved.
Therefore, although I accept that it would be foolish to underestimate the effects of the present troubles on job creation and attracting new industries, it is equally dangerous to over-estimate their effects and to make them, as they appear to have become, a convenient hook on which to hang excuses for lack of success.
Less than two years later, in the face of world recession and the economic policies of this Government, we in Northern Ireland feel isolated. We have seen the closures of the Heysham and Ardrossan ferries. We have seen the loss of our computer industry. We have seen great holes torn in our electronics industry. The number of textile factories which have closed are too numerous to mention. In my own constituency, six have closed in the past year.
Today, I received a letter from a leading textile manufacturer saying that Tillie & Henderson had closed down in Derry in the third quarter of 1975 throwing 300

people out of work and that he had just heard that the firm was closing completely with the loss of a further 600 jobs.
In addition, we have witnessed the exclusion of Harland and Wolff and Shorts from the nationalisation programme. I shall not argue these matters again, but they have added to the sense of isolation in Northern Ireland.
Our engineering industry is teetering on the brink of ruin. The publicly-owned company, Rolls-Royce, is throwing 800 men out of work. It is no good the Government saying that they could not have intervened if they had wanted to. We know that a wink and a nod in the right place could have influenced Rolls-Royce and could have held 800 vital jobs in Northern Ireland. If the Secretary of State for Employment had wanted to, he could have used his influence in support of the working people of Northern Ireland.
In the past two weeks, we have heard that another 2,000 men employed in defence and maintenance units are being thrown out of work as a result of a deliberate and premeditated act by this Government. It seems as though the Government's policy is that, when Northern Ireland is down, the best thing to do is to put in the boot. That is how it looks to the people of Northern Ireland.
We wonder why we have so many apprentices in training. In December 1975, the boast was that 3,000 people were undergoing training in Government training centres. How are they to be trained for unemployment? Would it not have been better not to raise the expectations of people by improving their qualifications, rather than casting them upon the rocks of the dole queue?

Mr. Orme: I understand the hon. Gentleman's strength of feeling, but, when he makes these accusations against the present Government and catalogues the disasters which have occurred, he should also put on the other side of the balance sheet the fact that this year £400 million of British taxpayers' money will be going to Northern Ireland in excess of the money raised in the Province itself. That is the largest subvention ever. Without that money, where would the Province be today?

Mr. McCusker: I appreciate that, but I wish that the Minister would not make it sound as though he was handing it out to a coconut colony and, with it, hoping to buy the loyalty of the people in Northern Ireland and to persuade them to accept the political consequences that he wishes to inflict upon them.
Thirty years after the war, Northern Ireland's engineering industry must now rely again on the shipyard, the aircraft factory and Mackies. That is a very precarious base. We have lost everything and, even in those three concerns, we no longer have the thousands who were employed in 1945.
I accept that there are no magic words and that there are no primrose paths to attain full employment. I know that, as a peripheral region, Northern Ireland will always have difficulty. I hope that that is why the Government are putting in additional money. I hope that it is to try to help this peripheral region overcome its problems.
It is a difficulty with which we must continue to grapple. But there are still opportunities. Last week, Mr. Cosgrave went to the United States, where we hope he dealt another body blow to the financial affairs of the IRA. But he did something more for his own people in the Republic. He brought back the promise of 3,000 jobs and six firms representing an investment of $105 million. Where were Northern Ireland's salesmen when these jobs were in the offing? Are the people who used to fight for jobs in Northern Ireland infected with the same lack of confidence as the present Ministers?
I welcomed the comments of the Secretary of State indicating, perhaps for the first time, the positive assurance that there was some stability in Northern Ireland and that he was working towards stability. The Government should stop making the task more difficult. In threatening Northern Irish Members and the people of Northern Ireland that their own instability is creating the problems, Ministers make the job more difficult. How can they go anywhere else to invite people to the Province?
The situation is not all bleak. We are told that Goodyear is prospering and expanding. That is an international American company. We have no reason

to believe that ICI, Courtaulds, Dupont and Grundig are not weathering the storm. These are success stories worth telling. Northern Ireland has something to offer. We have a pool of skilled and willing labour. As I have said, we have first-class training facilities. We have a record of high productivity and low absenteeism. We have an industrial relations record which is streets ahead of the position in this Kingdom and in the Republic. We hope that we still have Government initiatives and assistance which should be second to none. If, as I gather, the Minister is indicating his disagreement with any of the things that I have said, he is making my point for me. How can we go out and proclaim that Northern Ireland is a place where industry can come and prosper if he sits there indicating that that cannot be the case?

Mr. Martin Flannery: Give the minority some democracy.

Mr. McCusker: We believe that the Department of Commerce must again go after jobs and must again sell Northern Ireland, no matter how unattractive that may be to some Ministers on the Treasury Bench.

Mr. Orme: The hon. Gentleman is giving us a dialogue of facts which are in essence half facts. He talks about the Taoseach going to the United States after investment. Recently, I went there seeking investment. It is all very well for the hon. Gentleman to criticise us, but if my visit turns out to produce several hundred jobs, it will be a different story. But the difficulty I faced in the United States was that it was much more secure to invest in the Republic than in Northern Ireland. That is the difficulty that I have to overcome.

Mr. McCusker: I do not deny that. It will not be easy. But we cannot proclaim our instability, for which we are responsible frequently, and then try to tell people that the situation is quite the reverse. It would be better for the Minister, with the Department of Commerce, to mount a positive, imaginative campaign to bring more jobs to Northern Ireland than to preside over the last relics of the industrial and commercial life of Northern Ireland. This Government appear to be doing what the IRA


could not do in five years of bombs and bullets.

5.19 p.m.

Mr. Robert J. Bradford: If Northern Ireland is to survive as an economic manufacturing region of the United Kingdom, changes must be made in the strategy deployed in the Province. Among those changes there are three of paramount importance.
First, there must be a reversal of the trend which is narrowing an already narrow economic base. We have heard the Government's verbal commitment to this objective of widening the economic base as if it were an entirely new concept and as if it were a new burst of inspiration. But, as my hon. Friend the Member for Armagh (Mr. McCusker) has stated, since the end of the War we have witnessed sterling efforts by the Stormont Government to broaden the economic base.
With a dramatic reduction in the number of people employed in what we call the traditional industries—the textile and shipbuilding industries—alternative employment had to be provided. This was being achieved by introducing industries which were technologically based. As stated already, some 70 industries were introduced between 1950 and 1968, including Rolls-Royce, ICL and STC, providing some 72,000 jobs. Forty-two per cent. of the manufacturing industry in Northern Ireland was created in this period, demonstrating very forcibly that the economic base was being widened during what has been referred to euphemistically as a time of misguided rule.
An impressive rate of productivity, and an equally impressive record of industrial relationships, obtained right up to 1974. Even throughout the period from 1974 to the present time, we can claim pride of place in the United Kingdom concerning these two facets of industry, productivity and industrial relations. As late as 1974, the Financial Times and other commentators were referring to
Ulster's industrial enigma—strength in adversity".
What do we find now? We find a narrowing of the economic base and, as already stated, an unhealthy dependence once again upon the traditional industries —firms such as Mackie, Short and

Harland, Harland and Wolff, and the textile industry.
The Government's words about widening the economic base, and the need for a broad economic structure, have been valuable as an expression of sympathy and as an expression of an accurate analysis of the Northern Ireland plight at this moment. But action is needed to keep manufacturing jobs in being and to create more manufacturing jobs.
As for the Northern Ireland development agency or corporation—whichever title is chosen—I was encouraged when we heard from the Secretary of State that this body will be brought into being officially in the very near future, but industrialists in Northern Ireland are anxious that three or four matters of concern to them should be very much borne in mind. They are anxious that men of practical and successful industrial and commercial experience in Northern Ireland should be on the board of the agency or corporation. All too frequently the men appointed to such Government agencies and boards have not had practical or successful experience. Therefore, in this respect the views of the Northern Ireland CBI should be regarded as being of importance.
It is also important to encourage indigenous industries. We in Northern Ireland are sharing in the economic recession, which is affecting not only the United Kingdom but the rest of the world. We understand that, and we are not at all averse to accepting our responsibility in this difficult situation. But we believe that the Northern Ireland agency or corporation ought to encourage indigenous industries in order to help alleviate the economic recession. We do not want to find that the cycle has turned in a full circle, so that we have to face another recession just as we are finding our way out of this one.
Next, there should be assistance from the agency, if not complete control exercised by it, in regard to advisory marketing services. Reference was made to the all-important matter of creating jobs. If ever we needed to encourage this exercise, it is now. Only once in the last three years, if not longer, have we had any kind of industrial mission abroad. This should be a paramount function of the agency when it is established.

Mr. Orme: These facts obviously are not widely known, although they are publicly known and should be known widely, but the Department of Commerce has offices in the United States, in Brussels and in Japan, and maintains a network of contacts throughout the world in endeavouring to bring industry and investment to Northern Ireland.

Mr. Bradford: I take the Minister's point, but somehow it is much more effective to have representatives going out to seek investment on the basis of a firsthand knowledge of certain geographical areas which would commend themselves to certain industries, and to sell these areas with enthusiasm and in an informed way. Could we be told precisely when the agency will come into being and how much money will be at its disposal?
I refer next to the new era of confidence which, I believe, would ensue if the two major industries in Northern Ireland were kept under direct Westminster control. I refer to the aerospace industry and the shipbuilding industry. We have heard disturbing indications that both these industries may sooner or later be placed in the hands of and under the control of a Northern Ireland development agency. This is right out of keeping with the opinions and wishes of the people of Northern Ireland. I am very pleased to see the Minister dissenting from that suggestion which has caused fear.
In drawing attention to the need to instil new confidence into industry, I direct the attention of the House to the situation at Short and Harland. This is a company employing 6,000 people, and there are considerable doubts and anxieties about the viability of the company at the present time. Yet we are told that this company may well be used by the Government to form the basis for introducing new jobs involving highly technical skills. It is not a very firm basis on which to build, if the financial difficulties of the firm are a reality. Could we have a categorical assurance from the Secretary of State that Short and Harland will be assisted over what we believe will be a very short interim period of difficulty?
Part of the financial problem has been created by a delay in productivity relating to the SD 330 aircraft and the Blowpipe

missile. I am informed that the difficulties which caused these delays have now been resolved, and that by the end of 1977 the present production rate should be exceeded. But could we have a categorical assurance that money will be available to Shorts in the interim period —particularly relating to my hon. Friend's point that at Rolls-Royce 780 people have been told they may well be absorbed into this complex, or that their jobs may well be retained within it? Will the Minister therefore clear the doubt, anxiety and ambiguity concerning the financial future of Shorts?
Further, may I ask why the Government are presently not inclined to allow Shorts to manufacture a fuse for the missile which they designed. There has been great difficulty in getting a fuse for the missile which is currently manufactured on the mainland. I believe that one out of every 10 supplied does not function properly. The company has designed a fuse and has proved it an effective component, but neither Government have given it encouragement, even though it would have meant more jobs and higher productivity. Will the Minister of State therefore turn his mind to this possibility?
There is also the question of the military version of the SD330 aircraft. There is a great desire to adapt this aircraft for military purposes, and it can be done. It would provide employment very quickly. There is also the NATO-American project—some people call it AWAC, but it was reported in the Official Report recently as ARAWAC—and I hope that the Minister will give some thought to placing this contract, or at least as much of it as possible, with Shorts.
There is a final point about Shorts. I am told that the runway at Sydenham is absolutely vital to the future of the company if it is to be a complete aerospace industry. Shorts could become a kind of garaging base, having components manufactured here and there and carrying out a little bit of fitting. However, if the runway at Sydenham goes it will mean that Shorts will cease to be a complete aerospace industry. Therefore a commitment to retaining the runway at Sydenham is vitally important.
I turn now to Harland and Wolff. To the detriment of that great yard the company committed itself to the construction


of super-tankers. Here again I am informed, with a degree of intimacy and confidence, that the best way to diversify within the shipbuilding industry is not to branch out into oil rigs but to stick to either ship repair work or some other facet of shipbuilding. I am informed that Harland and Wolff has the capacity almost to create a conveyor belt ship repair process. Over the last five years not one admiralty or defence order has been placed with the company. It has tendered for 55 such defence contracts, but has been successful in only 14—not one in the last five years. Will the Minister of State consider diversification by channelling admiralty repair work to Harland and Wolff?

Mr. Orme: I cannot comment on the defence side of this issue because that is being considered at the moment. On the civil side, unfortunately we cannot attract ship repair work to Harland and Wolff because the crews will not bring the ships into Belfast and stay there. That is the sort of difficulty we are up against. Consultations are taking place between management and unions on the future of the yard. As soon as there are worker-directors on the board—I have given the scheme the green light—these matters can be resolved in discussions between the workers and the Government. That is what I want to happen.

Mr. Bradford: We are concerned with ushering in a new era of confidence, and I warn the Minister that the way in which the Rolls-Royce problem was resolved has the opposite effect to engendering confidence in Northern Ireland. Hon. Members were not given the opportunity to go straight to the person who took the decision—and let us not be ambiguous about this, the decision was taken by the Secretary of State for Industry, albeit with some consultation with Sir Kenneth Keith—and we were unable to put the facts directly to him. We were told by the Minister of State for Industry that even if Rolls-Royce proved that it was economic within the total combine, the decision would still not be reversed. That sort of approach makes our task immeasurably more difficult when we try to convince people in Northern Ireland that they will get a fair deal and a fair hearing. That factory still has a combined work force which is still intact.

Even at this last minute of the eleventh hour these people are anxious to remain part of the combine. I ask the Minister to bear in mind what the Minister of State for Industry said. Confidence must be engendered in the future of Shorts if the employees in Rolls-Royce are to be convinced that they have a future.
I turn now to the need for the temporary application of selective import controls. I know that it is counterproductive to apply import controls indiscriminately across the board. The country which does not seek to expert and thereby create reciprocal arrangements will flounder, but weekly we are receiving letters from desperate men in Northern Ireland in the made-up industries, men who are in dire straits. It is the duty of both the Minister and hon. Members to help these men. If 8,000 people are to be in work in the textile industry at the end of 1977 action must be taken now.
We welcome the Governments measures taken through LEDU, and we welcome the measures taken in the last three or four years. However, there is not the cohesion between Government and LEDU that we should like to see. In some situations LEDU has been counterproductive by setting up in a locality the sort of industry which already exists there. While we accept that LEDU has an important function in Northern Ireland, we believe that it must have closer liaison with the Government. I hope that the Minister of State will bear these points in mind.

ROYAL ASSENT

Mr. Speaker: I have to notify the House, in accordance with the Royal Assent Act 1967, that the Queen has signified Her Royal Assent to the following Acts and Measures:

1. Consolidated Fund Act 1976
2. Road Traffic (Drivers' Ages and Hours of Work) Act 1976
3. Trustee Savings Banks Act 1976
4. Education (School-leaving Dates) Act 1976
5. Solicitors (Scotland) Act 1976
6. Trade Union and Labour Relations (Amendment) Act 1976


7. Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act 1976
8. Water Charges Act 1976
9. Post Office (Banking Services) Act 1976

And to the following Measures passed under the provisions of the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act, 1919:
Cathedrals Measure 1976
Ecclesiastical Judges and Legal Officers Measure 1976

NORTHERN IRELAND

Question again proposed.

5.38 p.m.

Mr. Michael McNair-Wilson: It seems appropriate that we should link the two subjects of security and the economic situation in Northern Ireland in this debate. From unemployment come some of those at least who enter into terrorist acts. I think I quote the correct figure when I say that unemployment in areas such as the Bog-side and the Creggan in Londonderry is running as high as 40 per cent. It is clear that young people in particular who have nothing else to do can find themselves drifting into acts of terrorism simply because they are at a loose end.
Having said that, I think that I should pay my tribute to the security forces, both the Army and the police, for the tremendous part they have played together in keeping violence to the limits they have achieved, and, in particular, for the successes that the Secretary of State announced this afternoon.
Having paid that tribute, however, and having recently been in the Province, perhaps I may put two points, on which one of the Ministers may find it possible to comment in his winding-up speech. The first concerns a remark of a senior officer. That was that the one thing that all of us in this House had a responsibility to do was to deny any political or military credibilty to the Provisional IRA. And he went on to point out that we may talk about IRA brigades and IRA battalions, but so often these brigades may conceivably number 100 men and their battalions no more than 14. In those terms, to discuss them as though they were regular military units

which bore any comparison to our own forces was clearly out of the question.
Perhaps I should add that too often we have given a credibility in political terms to these terrorist organisations. Whereas one can sympathise with the Secretary of State in his desire to bring peace to the Province, such political negotiations, conversations or whatever may have taken place between the officials of his office and those groups have undermined in the eyes of the people in the Province confidence in the Secretary of State and his Ministers. I think that that lack of confidence should be borne in mind before anyone engages in such conversations in the future.
Perhaps I could also ask a question about Judges' Rules. I do not claim any legal knowledge. When I visited the Royal Ulster Constabulary Headquarters at Knock a senior policeman there said that in Northern Ireland the Judges' Rules that were used were those that were drawn up between 1916 and 1918, whereas in the rest of the United Kingdom rules were used that were drawn up in 1964. The point I make—I have no reason to suppose that this statement is not absolutely accurate—is that the Rules of the period 1916–18 give very much less latitude to the police in carrying out their difficult tasks of treating their detainees and in questions of interrogation, and so on. As the Attorney-General is present, perhaps he would care to comment on that point. It seems incredible that the police force in Northern Ireland is more limited than the police forces in the rest of the United Kingdom in the way in which it is able to question and generally to find out about the actions of those whom it is detaining.
I welcome the new strength of the RUC and its reserve. I was impressed by those whom we met and their determination to see this period of violence through to an end. However, I was equally concerned by the expression of another senior policeman, that there was a Mafia-type violence building up in the Province which had nothing to do with politics but which was born out of seven years of violence, sectarian murder and destruction.
I turn to the political situation. This is the first debate on Northern Ireland affairs that we have had since the end of the Convention, and, therefore, the


Province and its future, for the foreseeable future, must be seen in terms of direct rule—or "positive direct rule", as the Secretary of State has said. The Convention's break-down may be seen as a failure of Ulstermen to find common political institutions to which they could all agree. What all of us at Westminster have to realise is that it is a set-back, and a major set-back, to the policy of power sharing which has held sway in this Chamber since 1973.
While we may choose to lay the blame upon those in Northern Ireland for not seeing eye to eye in political terms, as we might have wished, we in turn must consider carefully whether the policy for power sharing has all the merits that we have believed it has, and whether we should not give very careful consideration to trying to impose a political shape and structure upon a part of the United Kingdom which has shown, and shown demonstrably, that it is not keen on such novelties.
I say that because I believe that the Secretary of State is now right to resist the temptation to have another go. A botched-up effort at this stage would set back any hope of an effective political initiative at some time in the future by a very long way. Therefore, we should accept the challenge of positive direct rule and make it a time of creative government in Northern Ireland.
I come to the question of any future political initiative if one is to be envisaged. If at some stage in the future the Secretary of State, of the present Government or any future Government, decides that a new political initiative for the Province is required, I hope that he will test the opinion of the people of Northern Ireland in a way that is different from the Convention. The possibility of a referendum opens itself to us and, as we have seen in recent cases, it can be an extremely successful way of finding out what the people think. We shall have a chance as we consider the devolution of government to Scotland and Wales to look at a pattern of devolution. For the life of me, I cannot quite see why it should not be turned into the United Kingdom pattern.
Whatever may be the case, timing will be of crucial importance. If we cannot find an initiative, perhaps we should wait

for the next General Election to find out what people in Northern Ireland feel about the political climate both in their Province and in the United Kingdom.
Northern Ireland now embarks on a period of direct rule which may be considerably longer than that which existed when the Conservative Government were in office. That means, as the Secretary of State said on 5th March, that Northern Ireland
is the responsibility of this House and of the Government."—[Official Report, 5th March 1976; Vol. 906, c. 1720.]
I might say that it has always been so, but clearly there is a new emphasis on this point, and indeed, they are portentous words. However, if positive direct rule is to mean anything different from that which has gone before, it must be positive in a way that government when taken by this side of the Irish Sea from Northern Ireland has so far failed to be. It has to establish the British element in that government, which has been missing.
I welcome the Government's statement about a new economic strategy for the Province. I know that the Government are trying to create new jobs and to attract new investment, and that they want new firms in the Province. Somehow or other, however, they always resist any of the bridges that could be built between London and Belfast. They always have a reason to explain why Northern Ireland is different and that if they were to follow the precedents of the rest of the United Kingdom, something curious would happen.
There has been the question whether Northern Ireland should have a greater representation in this Chamber. We all know that mathematically the argument is absolute. There is no counter-argument. However, when I suggested this last Thursday, the Secretary of State told me that it was a South-East England view. He described Northern Ireland as a "split community." He suggested that if only I understood that, I would understand why it was impossible to have the extra Members of Parliament.
On 5th March the right hon. Gentleman went so far as to say that he wanted only people—no; I must not be unfair. He said that "we" only wanted people to be in this House who wanted to be in the United Kingdom.
That is the most fallacious thing the Secretary of State could have said. The fact that those who may be elected in certain parts of Northern Ireland do not wish to come to this Chamber is their right. We cannot deny the electorate of Northern Ireland the same representation as we give Scotland, Wales or England. If we do so, we are playing about with democracy to suit ourselves. If those who come from Northern Ireland choose to spend their time here speaking against the Union, that is also their right because in a democracy we must hear every point of view. It is a dangerous fallacy to hold out the argument that Northern Ireland is a split community and that we do not want people here who do not share our views. I hope that the Secretary of State will think again.
I come to a point which has been raised so often—namely, whether Short Brothers and Harland should be in the soon-to-be-created British Aerospace Corporation or whether Harland and Wolff should be in the soon-to-be-created British Shipbuilders Corporation. We hear arguments to the effect that they are somehow different—but how are they different? Harland and Wolff is completely nationalised at the moment. Its workers naturally wonder why they should be split off from the British Shipbuilding Corporation. What benefit will it bring them to be in that situation, and who can blame them if they feel that Ministers in this House, and indeed most hon. Members in the House of Commons, do not want Northern Ireland brought into the United Kingdom—in other words, that we want to keep them at arm's length? The workers at Short Brothers have the same nagging feeling.
Perhaps the Minister will try to allay the fear in the minds of some directors in Short Brothers, also a nationalised company, that if they are not in the British Aerospace Corporation, who is to decide what share of Government money they should receive on such matters as research and development? Are they to be pushed to one side while the British Aerospace Corporation has the undivided attention of the Secretary of State for Industry and the Government? If we believe in positive direct rule, let us try to put Ulster as nearly as possible on all fours with the rest of the country.

Let us use this period of direct rule to build up the confidence of the people of Ulster.
When I went to Northern Ireland on a recent visit as a guest of Her Majesty's Government, I was entertained to an excellent dinner in Stormont Castle. Sitting round the table were a number of Ministers and civil servants. Not one of those civil servants was a Northern Irelander. I wondered why this should be. Is it doubted whether the Northern Ireland Civil Service can govern its own Province? In the Scottish and Welsh Offices they have respectively a Scottish Secretary of State and a Welsh Secretary of State. We also find that the civil servants in those offices owe something to the place they are expected to govern.
I hope that when we consider Northern Ireland's future in this new—and, we hope, exciting—period of government from Westminster, we shall also not turn our backs on the abilities and skill of Northern Irelanders, whether they be in industry or in the Northern Irish Civil Service.

5.55 p.m.

The Attorney-General (Mr. Samuel Silkin): A number of questions have been asked that fall within my province. I shall try to deal with them as shortly as possible because I know that many hon. Members wish to take part in this discussion.
I was asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, West (Mr. Fitt), in an intervention, to say something about the recent allegation by Mr. Taylor, who when representing a client before a resident magistrate suggested that the prosecuting authorities and the police were deliberately charging people with murder when the evidence came nowhere near to justifying that charge. Mr. Taylor went on to say:
The complicity of the Director of Public Prosecutions in this fraud is unreservedly deplorable.
I regard the words used by Mr. Taylor as unreservedly deplorable, irresponsible and totally lacking any foundation of fact.
The Belfast Telegraph, dealing with the charges, said:
If Mr. Taylor has evidence to substantiate his charge and he has wide experience in the criminal field, he should produce it. He has introduced doubts in people's minds which cannot be allowed to fester.


I agree with that comment and I should like to say a few words about the procedure leading to the eventual trial of a person charged with murder.
The initial charges are made by the police and they make those charges without consulting the Director of Public Prosecutions for Northern Ireland. In the case of scheduled offences, of which murder is one, they send a brief summary to the Director to enable him to recommend to me whether to certify for jury trial or against it. If necessary, I can ask for further information in making my decision. It is important to do so at an early stage because the special provisions for scheduled offences affect questions such as bail and other matters dealt with before the magistrates.
The accused person if on remand comes before the magistrates weekly until the committal date is fixed. At those remand hearings a member of the staff of the Director attends on behalf of the police—not in a prosecuting capacity, but solely to save the time of the police in dealing with matters that are largely formal. He knows sufficient about the case to deal with the question of bail and other matters that arise—but no more. It is not until the conclusion of the police investigation when they are ready to submit their file to the Director that he has a full knowledge of the circumstances of any particular case.
When the Director obtains the file he studies it and at that stage directs the charges on which he proposes to seek committal. It is at that stage for the first time that he considers the evidence, it is at that stage for the first time that any lawyer considers the evidence, and it is at that stage in Northern Ireland, as in Great Britain, that the view may be taken that the evidence does not support the original charges. It may support other less serious charges.
If the Director takes the view that the evidence does not support the charge of murder, but may support a less serious charge, he will direct that the less serious charge should be preferred, and the committal will take place on that basis. The Director is in charge of the committal proceedings and of the prosecution thereafter.
I want now to put some figures before the House. If any hon. Member wishes more detailed figures, I shall be glad to

write to him. Since the 1973 Act was passed, 275 persons have been charged with scheduled murder. Of those, 42 had the charge of murder withdrawn before the committal stage. However, to calculate the percentage of withdrawals, those 42 must be compared with 188 cases which have gone to the DPP. So far 144 persons have been committed for trial and dealt with at the Belfast City Commission. Those not yet dealt with by way of trial, but whose cases have been considered by the Department, total 29 committed and 15 murder charges directed. Those 44 cases plus the 144 dealt with make up the total of 188. Of those 188 cases, 42 charges of murder—22 per cent. —were withdrawn before committal.
However, if Mr. Taylor had any such figures in mind, he did not apply his mind to the further charges which in many cases were directed against persons tried where it was thought that the evidence would not substantiate charges of murder. Those charges have invariably been of a serious character and have arisen out of the planning or execution of a murder or of providing aid for the principal parties prior to or following the commission of the crime. Those cases number 27. That left only 15 people who, after being charged with murder, had all charges against them withdrawn. That represents a figure of 8 per cent. as against the 22 per cent. mentioned earlier.
There were various reasons why that happened. Sometimes evidence of identification was not regarded as sufficiently strong to enable the cases to be proved. There have also been cases in which, unfortunately, witnesses have refused to give evidence and which in consequence could not be pursued on the basis of murder.
In addition, there have been nine cases where the accused were arrested in circumstances which gave rise to grave suspicion of complicity in the crime charged—the police were entitled to bring the charge— but in which, after lengthy police investigation and careful consideration by lawyers in the Department and sometimes by Crown counsel, the decision was taken to withdraw the charge.
The suggestion made by Mr. Taylor bears some similarity to a suggestion which was made when my predecessor and the hon. and learned Member for Wimbledon (Sir M. Havers) were in office.


My predecessor took the unusual step of issuing a printed rebuttal of some highly detailed allegations which were then made.
It is interesting that The Criminal Law Review, which gave considerable publicity to the original report, when the answer was produced, stated:
At first sight these figures
—figures produced by the Attorney-General—
fortify the conclusions of the Cobden Trust.
—which made the original allegation.
But they take on an entirely different colour when the circumstances in which the charges were withdrawn are considered. In twenty out of the twenty-one cases in which the Section 41 charges were withdrawn, the defendant pleaded guilty to other offences (including three cases of murder and six cases of crime involving a maximum of life imprisonment).
It is hard to avoid the contention in the Law Officers' Report that statistics on the withdrawal of charges are meaningless without reference to the full facts and circumstances of each case and that no conclusions can safely or properly be drawn from them.
That applies equally to the totally deplorable allegations which are now made, particularly the allegation of fraud and that the Director, who does such admirable work in this difficult area, is a party to that fraud.
I turn now to another matter which has been mentioned in the debate.

Rev. Ian Paisley: I am sure that the right hon. and learned Gentleman is aware that Mr. Taylor's allegation was reinforced by a prominent member of the SDLP—Mr. Duffy. Has he any comments to make on his further statement on these matters?

The Attorney-General: I have given the facts. It is not necessary for me to make any further comments. The facts are there for all to see. I have offered to provide the necessary figures by letter if they are required.
I was about to deal with two other matters which have been mentioned. Here the suggestion has been made that, so far from the prosecuting authorities taking too strong a view, they have taken too lax a view. That has been said of the cases of Mr. McGuinness and Mr. Agnew. There has been some criticism of the

Both those cases were thoroughly discussed between myself and the Director of Public Prosecutions for Northern Ireland. We were in entire agreement on the result.
In Mr. McGuinness's case, no admissions were made. There was no evidence to connect him with the matters of which complaint had been made, other than going back to the days of the Special Provisions Act in 1972, since when he has been sent to prison on more than one occasion for membership of a proscribed organisation in the Republic of Ireland. There was no recent evidence of membership of a proscribed organisation. Therefore, for that reason, and that reason alone, no charges were brought. I assure the House that, where we can bring evidence to support a charge of membership of a proscribed organisation, we shall have no hesitation in doing so.
Reference was made to the public speech made by Mr. Agnew and also, on the same platform, by Mrs. Drumm. It has been suggested that Mr. Agnew might have been tried for sedition, for an offence under the Public Order Act (Northern Ireland), or for encouragement to murder under Section 4 of the Offences Against the Person Act (Northern Ireland). The evidence consisted of the police transcript of what he said, his own statement to the police, and various conflicting newspaper reports which were not consistent one with another.
However, having examined this extremely closely together with the Director—because I, too, would not hesitate to support a charge in cases of this kind if evidence were available—it was entirely clear that what evidence we had of what this gentleman had said was wholly consistent, not with a threat or incitement or encouragement to murder, but with a warning as to what he suggested would be likely to happen in certain circumstances. We have had precisely that situation involving other people before.
The right hon. Member for Belfast, East (Mr. Craig) in particular has been referred to publicly in that context in relation to two speeches he made, and we came to the same conclusion at that time. It is not sufficient that a speech should be made which simply warned of what other people might be likely to do. There


must be a direct encouragement to murder, a threat or something of that kind, and we had no doubt whatever that it could not be sustained in that case. If it could have been, Mr. Agnew undoubtedly would have been prosecuted.
Finally, may I deal with the question of possible new offences, raised by the hon. Member for Abingdon (Mr. Neave), and protection for witnesses, and take in with that, if I may, the point made by the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. McNair-Wilson), about Judges' Rules. The Gardiner Report, on page 25, spoke of the possibility of a new offence of being concerned in terrorism and it set out the kind of thing it had in mind. There was a considerable amount of doubt whether the terms of the offence which it was considering were such as to enable us to incorporate those terms within the law. At that stage, when the amending Act was produced, it was thought better to concentrate on simpler, clearer offences, as I said in winding-up that debate. That does not mean that we have stopped thinking about this, and considering the possibilities of new offences of a character which are concerned with terrorism. We are at this moment giving most careful consideration to such offences and if we find that we can put into clear words something which is a significant addition, which fills a gap in the existing law, then I have no doubt that we shall be ready to do so. But we have not yet reached a stage at which we can say that that is possible.
The hon. Member for Newbury mentioned the Judges' Rules. The position as he put it is quite correct. They are Judges' Rules and are not rules made by the Executive. There is a difference between Northern Ireland and this country. So far as scheduled offences are concerned, however, the matter is governed not by the Judges' Rules but by the express provisions in Section 6 of Emergency Provisions Act 1973. If the hon. Member will be good enough at his leisure to look at that, he will see that the provisions of that section are very stringent. Indeed, it is only because the judges in Northern Ireland, in dealing with that section and with these cases generally, exercise the type of jurisprudence which the common law recognises, that cases of grave injustice are avoided

which, on a strict interpretation of the section, might well be possible. At any rate, they are not hamstrung in dealing with scheduled offences by the difference between their Judges' Rules and ours.
The hon. Member for Abingdon said the Opposition would support any strengthening of the law proposed by the Government. We are most grateful to him for that and I hope that if we find that there are gaps that need to be filled, we shall have his co-operation in filling them. But let us not delude ourselves into believing that changes in the law alone can destroy terrorism, for of course they cannot. They can help, but in the end there must be a fair balance in the law between constraint and freedom. To go too far in the erosion of traditional liberties and traditional safeguards can easily be counter-productive.
In the end we must conquer the hearts and minds of the vast majority who feel the bitter consequences of violence. That requires patience in a situation where to be patient is almost intolerable. None the less, again and again, as my right hon. Friend has said, we must seek positive and constructive solutions. That is the policy of the Government and I believe, with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, that the House and the nation support it.

6.16 p.m.

Mr. Gerard Fitt: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, in opening the debate, dealt with the security situation in Northern Ireland. This is certainly a subject which concerns every hon. Member for Northern Ireland and all in this House. The Attorney-General answered a query which I had raised by way of intervention in relation to statements made by a very prominent member of the legal profession —remarks substantiated by another solicitor, Mr. Paddy Duffy. It is statements such as these which give rise to concern among many people in Northern Ireland. I have no great knowledge of the legal profession and I can only depend upon statements made at the Dispatch Box by my right hon. Friend.
I agree with him that it was a very good thing to do away with detention and to use the due process of the law to bring people before the courts. But in that situation I, like many thousands


of people in Northern Ireland, depend on the courts to see justice given to everyone in Northern Ireland. If a prominent member of the legal profession is not aware of what is happening, and if the procedure alluded to this evening by my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General produces, inevitably, delays, then it is understandable that ordinary people, if they have some suspicions in their mind, should be concerned.
I believe that the Attorney-General should now take it upon himself to make whatever representations he can to the Incorporated Law Society in Northern Ireland to explain the position in relation to the numbers of people who have come before the courts originally charged with murder and have had those charges subsequently dropped, because these two statements, and particularly the originating statement from Mr. Taylor, have caused confusion and discontent and we cannot afford to have confusion or suspicion in Northern Ireland in respect of the law.
The Attorney-General should perhaps take this much further. We cannot let this issue die and the Attorney-General should make representations either to the Director of Public Prosecutions, or to the Incorporated Law Society that they should tell their own members exactly what the procedure is, so that they do not make statements or allegations which may subsequently prove unfounded.
In relation to the security situation, which we have discussed on so many occasions, the Minister of State will be aware that the big worry about security now is not that related to the military, police or security forces as such. The cause for concern now is the growing number of sectarian murders, particularly in the city of Belfast. These have been carried out in a most brutal and heinous way, completely uncivilised. Victims have been shot, they have had their throats cut and have been stabbed, and there have been anonymous telephone calls put through to newspapers stating that the next person to die would be decapitated. All this is causing concern, and even if it means that the security forces must lessen their efforts in other directions, they should apply all possible security to try

to apprehend those guilty of such heinous murders.
There are periods of quiet in the operations of the security forces in Northern Ireland and then, for some unknown reason, I get complaints about an upsurge in harassment by the military. This dies down, only to happen again in two or three months. We are in the middle of such a period of complaints at the moment. Only last week, several people told me, in person and by telephone, of harassment throughout North and West Belfast. Many people who are not involved in terrorist activities have been put to inconvenience by this heightened harassment. There may be a reason for it—I do not know—but if there is not, it can be counter-productive by inflaming passions and opinions.
I suppose that this debate is mainly about economic questions. The hon. Member for Armagh (Mr. McCusker) was unfair in seeking to place all the blame for our economic and employment problems on the British Government. Last week. I had no hesitation in allying myself with other Northern Ireland Members and condemning the Government for the defence cuts in the Province, which will lead to 2,000 men losing their jobs. That was a direct Government responsibility for which they should be condemned.
But, in both sections of the community in Northern Ireland, we are largely the architects of our own misfortune. Who can expect outside investors to have confidence when they read about the endemic violence in Northern Ireland? The Secretary of State went to the United States and made many speeches to commercial organisations to try to attract investment. When the Executive was in being, up to May 1974, my colleague, John Hume, who was then Minister of Commerce, undertook an arduous tour of America, with the same object. Unfortunately, those efforts have not been successful.
When outside investment cannot be attacted, there is a responsibility on the Government to create commercial development by their own efforts, but only a fool would believe that the Government could increase their own commercial investment to such a level as to do away with unemployment. That is asking for far too much.
Anyone who read the article in the Financial Times yesterday will have had cause for suspicion. It showed that over the past two years 50 local firms in Northern Ireland have gone out of existence. As a result, £50 million a year in wages is no longer circulating in the Province, and £80 million a year will have to be paid out in unemployment and social security benefit. Those figures must give the Government cause for concern.
I am still not convinced that we have the close co-operation between the trade union movement and the Government which is necessary. It is strange that a Socialist Government may have fallen down in this way. Perhaps it is due to the inability of the trade union movement —I am not sure who is to blame—but representatives of the movement have expressed concern to me at the lack of cohesion between them and the Government.

Mr. Orme: Will my hon. Friend give some examples? The Northern Ireland Office meets representatives of the trade union movement in Northern Ireland more often than any of my ministerial colleagues meet the unions in Great Britain. They are consulted on the Economic Council and they are put on all the major bodies. Their representations, like those of the CBI, are treated at the highest level by the British Government.

Mr. Fitt: My right hon. Friend rightly asks for examples. I have here a submission by the Northern Ireland Committee of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions. It says that it wants the Economic Council to have more independence in reaching decisions and not to be hindered by Government intervention; that it could then express a more impartial or aggressive point of view. The document says:
The role and functions of the Northern Ireland Economic Council should be extended to cover social and economic matters. The Council should be made independent of Government so that it may offer constructive criticism of official policies in these areas. The Council should be afforded the right of initiative, in order that it may examine and report on such problems as levels of poverty, consumer protection and regional inequalities.
I can only take those words to mean what they say. They must express some dissatisfaction. I accept that there is a

great deal of discussion with the trade union movement.

Mr. Orme: This is an important point. If the trade unions want an independent Economic Council, what is the point of the Government's being there at all? The council can meet as an independent body and make representations to the Government. What we want are the type of consultations that take place in Great Britain on the NEDC, among Government, industry and all sections of people concerned with the economy. It is not a body that passes resolutions. The Government must govern. Of course we listen to representations and we shall discuss these proposals with the unions, but it is only right to spell out some of the doubts that the Government have at this moment.

Mr. Fitt: I am glad that I have brought this matter to the Minister's attention. It seemed that there was some room for closer co-operation. I shall be having discussions with trade unionists throughout Northern Ireland and I hope that a better arrangement can be made. I agree with my hon. Friend in not wanting to create another talking shop in Northern Ireland. We have had far too many talking shops over there, and they have all been fruitless; they have meant absolutely nothing. But, so far as we can, we should involve the Irish Congress of Trade Unions in any social and economic decisions.
The Northern Ireland Committee of the ICTU says in its submission that there are 30,000 people on the Housing Executive's waiting lists, while 12,000 construction workers are unemployed—workers who could be building houses. There seems to me to be great disparity in thinking. People need jobs and houses. The ICTU has put forward proposals that are interesting, particularly in view of allegations by some Opposition Members about dishonest contractors and inefficient members of the Housing Executive.
The ICTU says:
The NI Housing Executive should set up a subsidiary company on its own to manufacture housing components such as … concrete blocks up to BS insulation standards, doors and door frames, windows, including glazing units, kitchen and built-in furniture.
There are bricklayers, plumbers, electricians, carpenters and woodworkers in


the construction industry in Northern Ireland. If all those talents were combined under the agency of the Housing Executive, cutting out unscrupulous contractors who are in the business only for profit and who are not concerned whether their work is efficient, it would soak up unemployment and create new homes.
A question was asked earlier about the Government's policy in respect of the Northern Ireland transport undertaking. There is a great deal of dissatisfaction about the high cost and gross inefficiency of the transport system in Northern Ireland.
The situation in Northern Ireland is undoubtedly grave, and we all sincerely hope that it will get better in the months that lie ahead, but if the predictions in the Financial Times yesterday are to be believed there must be cause for real despondency. It says that Ulster industry is now working within the law of diminishing returns, and the concluding sentence reads:
Northern Ireland, which was once an industrial power house, is now inceasingly a millstone.
If we are to take those words as meaning what they say they can only create despondency in our constituencies. I hope that this forecast, printed in a responsible newspaper and by someone who should know what he is talking about, is inaccurate, because if it is accurate we now have a very bad situation in Northern Ireland.
I want to impress upon my right hon. Friend the Minister of State that there are people in Northern Ireland who know that he has a very difficult job and that he has had to overcome a great many obstacles over the past two years. Many people within and without the trade union movement have great admiration for him and for the courage and tenacity with which he has tackled these obstacles. I certainly would not want to associate myself with the attempt of the hon. Gentleman the Member for Armagh this afternoon, to make a scapegoat of the Minister of State or the Ministers in Northern Ireland.
We have great problems. I am not satisfied with the figure of 11 per cent. unemployed, which is the highest figure of any of the regions within the European Economic Community, but I do not

believe that we can get the co-operation of the Government by continuously criticising Ministers who have tried to do a most difficult job in most difficult circumstances. This is not the time to be complacent. The next six months will be crucial; indeed, Northern Ireland's destiny may be decided within the next six months.

6.33 p.m.

Mr. Philip Goodhart: At the end of his speech opening this debate the Secretary of State referred to a public opinion poll which suggested that direct rule in Northern Ireland was perhaps less unpopular than might have been expected. I am surprised that the Secretary of State should refer to any public opinion polls at all in a debate that deals largely with security, because a recent poll on the question of security showed that in Northern Ireland at the beginning of 1974 more than two-thirds of the population had confidence in the way in which the security policy was being conducted, whilst now—at least, a matter of about two months ago—less than 20 per cent. have confidence in the way in which the security policy is being conducted.
This, of course, is no criticism of the soldiers and the policemen themselves. The defence White Paper that has recently been published pays tribute to the courage, steadfastness and strength of purpose of the security forces, and I am sure that that view is shared by almost all Members of this House and an overwhelmingly wide cross-section of people outside it.
Some of us who have gone fairly regularly to Northern Ireland, however, have noted a certain degree of pessimism among the security forces themselves in recent months.
It is easy to understand why this note of pessimism creeps into their conversation. In the past there has always been something to look forward to, in the way of political development or developments on the security side: a power-sharing executive; the calling of the Convention; the end of the no-go areas; the introduction of internment; the end of internment. There has always been some prospect of change which would bring improvement. But now the security forces are faced with the fact that they


have literally to soldier on in much the same pattern for a long time to come.
Then there is the question of people getting tired. The defence White Paper refers to the fact that four major units in the Army have now completed six terms of emergency tours in the Province. But the strain on the police and the Ulster Defence Regiment is much greater than that. For month after month—indeed, year after year— members of the Royal Ulster Constabulary have been doing more than 20 hours a week overtime. It is only natural that there should be a feeling of tiredness as year follows year and the terrorist toll continues.
There have been substantial successes in terms of arrests of people on charges of terrorism, and the Secretary of State is right to take pride and, indeed, pleasure, in that—if one can take pleasure in the number of people arrested for terrorist crimes and for murder.
Hon. Members on both sides of the House are apt to refer to all terrorists as being criminal psychopaths and madmen. Some of them no doubt are, but there is one other common characteristic which almost all those who have been arrested and brought before the courts recently have shared—and I have this on the authority of those, the judgment of many of whom I trust, who have talked to those people. The people who are being arrested and brought before the courts are almost invariably extremely stupid. They are some of the dimmest members of the community, on both sides.
One does not expect people of high intelligence to join either the Provisional IRA or the Ulster Volunteer Force, but the level of intelligence of those being arrested and imprisoned at the moment suggests that we are getting only the bomb carriers, the bomb throwers, and the lowest level of gunmen, and that the top level of terrorists are largely untouched. That is also causing substantial alarm and concern among the security forces.
I see from the defence White Paper that Regulations were made under the Northern Ireland Emergency Provisions Act 1973 requiring the compulsory immobilisation of unattended vehicles in Northern Ireland. What we need is some compulsory immobilisation of the top men in the IRA. I know that Ministers are

turning their minds to this problem. In his speech this afternoon the Secretary of State pointed out the difficulty of applying laws as they are now applied in Southern Ireland, where a man can be convicted merely on the word of a senior police officer that he is a terrorist. But we heard very little from the Attorney-General on how the Government's mind is turning in tackling the problem of dealing with the top terrorists—the men who sit and plan and plot the outrages that other less intelligent mortals carry out for them.

The Attorney-General: That is precisely the problem that we are seeking to solve. It is a gap that we are trying to fill. If we can find an acceptable way of doing it, we shall do it.

Mr. Goodhart: I am delighted to hear that, but I press upon the Attorney-General the urgent need to find a solution.
It has never been my case that the Government have not given proper resources to the police. The Secretary of State has shown an understanding of their problems and has tried to make resources available to them. Over the past 15 years the budget of the Royal Ulster Constabulary has grown from about £1½ million to £50 million. We cannot complain about that. But I do not believe that the Government show a similar understanding of the problems facing the Ulster Defence Regiment or of the scope for expansion of its work.
In the defence debate last year I had in my prepared notes a comment agreeing with the words of praise that would be uttered by the Secretary of State for Defence for the work of the UDR, but there were no words of praise in his speech. From the reference to the UDR in this year's defence White Paper one does not learn of the immense amount of work that it does and the long hours put in by its members in defence of the community.
I hope that in the next few months we shall see an expansion in the UDR's rôle. We know that some of those who have borne the highest responsibility for security in Northern Ireland believe that it would now be right to have a full-time company of the regiment in every battalion. It would not be expensive to implement that. Unemployment is a good recruiting sergeant, and it would not be


difficult to find the men to man those units.
We on this side of the Irish Channel all too often forget how much of the internal security work is done by the people of Northern Ireland themselves. I hope that through an increase in the full-time strength of the UDR the ability of the people of Northern Ireland to defend themselves will be further enhanced.

6.43 p.m.

Rev. Ian Paisley: The first priority for the people of Northern Ireland is security. The ordinary man in Northern Ireland is not at present very interested in the forms of government, or the arguments whether we should have this form or that form. But he is interested in his personal security and the security of his wife and family, and the right to live and work and enjoy the things that he should enjoy.
It is a good thing that the debate should have a sobering effect on Ministers and hon. Members who listen to it. I was very worried by the Secretary of State's criticism of those who like to see an Army presence in South Armagh. It is essential that the people see an Army presence. I am sure that my hon. Friend who represents that constituency would fully agree. I was in the area recently when the IRA carried out the brutal murder of a member of the Ulster Defence Regiment by hacking him to death with a knife. The people of the area said that for three days they had not seen one Army vehicle. It is a matter of the utmost necessity that the Army be seen in the outlying areas—almost no-go areas, or no-man's land.
At the border recently I found that the Customs station had been moved back two miles on the Clones road. I was told that no vehicle went beyond that Customs check. Does that mean that those two miles have been surrendered to the Irish Republican Army? The Secretary of State must take note of such matters. They are no criticism of the Army and its personnel. The people of Northern Ireland appreciate all that the Army has done. We are glad about the defusing of every bomb that would otherwise have caused havoc. We admire the men who put their lives at risk every day.

Mr. Orme: Mr. Baird does not.

Rev. Ian Paisley: Mr. Baird will have to speak for himself.
When the Army puts out statements that are later discovered not to be founded on fact there are bound to be comments. The Army made a statement that a certain tanker was under constant surveillance, but it was then driven to Bessbrook and blown up in the centre of the town. Naturally, the man whose shop was blown up had hard things to say about the Army's statement.
If the police are to take primacy in the battle against terrorism, they must be properly equipped. They must have the fire power to deal with terrorists and they must have the proper vehicles. One point baffles me. When I talk to the Secretary or State on deputations he tells me that this is a matter for the Chief Constable, but then I am told by representatives of the police trade union that they have made representations to the Secretary of State and he has agreed that certain vehicles should be ordered. Who is responsible for the ordering of vehicles for the RUC?
There is a serious situation in South Londonderry. Some parts are becoming as bad as South Armagh. The Secretary of State said that because the Ulster Defence Regiment is almost entirely a Protestant force it cannot move into certain areas. That means that members of the UDR are not permitted to enter certain parts that are controlled by the terrorists and are almost no-go areas. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will give us answers on these important matters.
The economy has been mentioned. In housing and house repairs something could be done to give men employment.

6.49 p.m.

Mr. J. Enoch Powell: I am glad that the House, by one of its typical unspoken collective decisions, has decided to take a little more time for this debate, for we would not wish the Minister of State to be stinted in his reply.
It is an irony, but a pleasant and happy irony, that in one of the first weeks after the inception of what is rather quaintly called direct rule—meaning,


roughly speaking, the form of government under which the rest of the United Kingdom lives—the House has devoted two half days in the Chamber and three mornings in Committee to the affairs of Northern Ireland. I hope the 1½ million citizens of the United Kingdom who live in Northern Ireland will not get the impression that two days in the House and three days in Committee will be devoted to them every week; but, it was a happy chance that this conjuncture occurred so early, for it shows the extensive opportunities which hon. Members representing Northern Ireland have to bring the affairs of the Province to the attention of the House and the Government.
As he has done previously, the Secretary of State gave us a number of important statistics showing the scale upon which security forces had scored successes and were continuing to do so. He expressed his disappointment, which we all share, that these statistics and their message somehow do not seem to get across. Somehow, the real involvement of Government and Parliament in the affairs of the people of Northern Ireland, the progress which is made and the successes in countering the IRA and other terrorist organisations, do not make the impression we would all wish.
I am sorry the Secretary of State is not present. One understands that there are exciting events taking place outside the Chamber in which he may, in some way be participating; but I am sure that a suggestion I wish to make will be conveyed to him and discussed with him. I have in any case given him some notice of the point I intend to make.
To some extent, we are still in an experimental period in the handling of Northern Ireland affairs in this House, and I believe the time has come when we can make an important advance. We need to bring to bear the instrumentality of a Select Committee, with its power to interrogate, hear witnesses, ask questions and follow a line of questioning, upon Northern Ireland in the coming months. For while we are grateful for the opportunities offered by the Northern Ireland Committee and make the utmost use of our openings on the Floor of the House, nothing can replace, for the purpose of reassuring the public and dealing

with doubts and difficulties such as those rightly expressed by the hon. Member for Belfast, West (Mr. Fitt) earlier, the opportunity to pursue issues relentlessly by inquiry and interrogation.

Mr. Orme: The right hon. Gentleman has written to my right hon. Friend, who will consider his suggestion. However, I must make clear that the Government could not countenance security matters being discussed in such a Select Committee. That would be completely ruled out.

Mr. Powell: I am sorry the right hon. Gentleman has slammed that door before he has really had a chance to consider the proposal. He does not need to tell me the importance, which came out earlier in the debate, of information, indication or hints which could be of use to the enemy not being divulged through the parliamentary process. That is understood very well indeed. However, there are many matters investigated by Select Committees in which national security is involved and sensitive matters are dealt with. The House and Select Committees find ways to get over that difficulty, and we might have to find ways of getting over it in a Select Committee dealing with Northern Ireland.
I do not envisage my suggestion resulting in any increased total burden on Ministers, who already carry a large burden, or on other hon. Members, but we do lack, and are felt by those we represent to lack, a means of pursuing matters which are opened up in debate but not brought to a conclusion fully satisfactory to those outside. I was by no means an admirer of the Select Committee process in its early days; but the House has found the procedure useful in many branches of administration, and I trust the Government will not just put aside my suggestion. We ought to look for new means whereby the responsibility of Government and Parliament to the people of Northern Ireland and the way it is being discharged can be made clear and manifest.
I do not wish to speak at length on the economy of Northern Ireland which has been dealt with in admirable speeches by my hon. Friends the Members for Belfast, South (Mr. Bradford) and Armagh (Mr. McCusker). The speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Armagh provoked objections in some quarters: but there is


no hon. Member who, if his constituency had the same unemployment, with the anxieties attaching to it, as some constituencies in Northern Ireland, would not be expected to be on his feet making speeches like that of my hon. Friend the Member for Armagh. It is no use pretending that this House provides a forum for the ventilation of grievances if we take it amiss when hon. Members like my hon. Friend the Member for Armagh make speeches like the one he contributed to the debate.
There is one matter only on the economic side which I wish to stress, and that is transport. The Secretary of State referred to the high level of Government involvement in the economy of Northern Ireland and said how much he was impressed by it. This is a subject on which political divisions can be very acute; but no one concerned with the affairs of Northern Ireland imagines that this high level of Government involvement can be rapidly altered or dispensed with in the foreseeable future. But while there are areas in which there is no alternative to the involvement of Government and its authority, there are other areas in which the more spontaneous and selective the forms of development, the better and more stable is likely to be the employment which results.
However, responsibility for infrastructure—as the jargon has it—undeniably rests with the Government, and the economic problems of Northern Ireland have always been rooted in communications— not the internal communications, which, in many respects, are very good, but the communications with the rest of the United Kingdom.
This is not a new problem. Since we are talking about direct rule, it is significant that one of the consequences of parliamentary union in 1800 was a tremendous improvement and development of communications between the capital—and indeed, the whole of Great Britain—and the island of Ireland. We have to take that lesson to heart. Northern Ireland has great potential assets. It has the advantages of a small area, with easy access to ports. It has the advantage of a work force which is anxious to work and which has shown a high level of good industrial relations. But it can only realise these advantages if it

can compete on tolerable terms of transportation with the rest of the Kingdom.
Transport is essentially time. Especially with the development of containerisation and other new forms of transport, it is time that counts. If a place in County Down or County Armagh is only a few hours distant from a market or a further stage of industrial processing in Great Britain, the initial processing may just as well be carried out in Northern Ireland as in the North or South-West of England.
I cannot overstress the crucial importance of maintaining and developing the air and sea routes. What has caused most dismay and damage to morale in Northern Ireland in these last years has been the sensation that inexorably these channels of communication were being restricted and dried up. I understand the impact which terrorism and the bomber have had on these forms of communication; but that does not alter the fact that facilitity of communication, speed of communication, regularity of communication, and variety of channels of transportation are the key to the development of the Northern Ireland economy. We might almost exaggerate and say to the Government "Give us that key, and you will be surprised how we can open up the resources that we have."
I turn from the economy to the subject on which I want mainly to concentrate, that of security. In Northern Ireland, security is in the hands of a trinity —the RUC and its reserves, the UDR and its reserves, and the Army. The hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. McNair-Wilson) was dead right when he drew a contrast between ordinary military operations and what the armed forces commonly conceive as a war—whether or not in inverted commas—which is being waged in Northern Ireland against the IRA and other forms of terrorism. Too often, people who discuss operations in Northern Ireland seem to think that they are talking about a battle between armoured formations in the North German plain; and sometimes the Army itself finds it difficult to distinguish the realities of Northern Ireland from the different strategic and tactical backgrounds in which its members have been trained and brought up.
In the war in which all the security forces are engaged in Northern Ireland


the crucial factor is information. No war can be fought without intelligence; but the war in Northern Ireland is 95 per cent. a matter of intelligence. Its ebb and flow, success and failure, and ultimate victory depend upon information. How right the Secretary of State was when he said that the IRA and the terrorists shrivel without public support and a safe haven, and that those are denied to them by a stable society. It is stability which is the sentence of death to the IRA and the terrorists. Putting it more precisely, it is the conviction in the minds of the people amongst whom they operate that things will continue to be as they are, that the IRA and the terrorists will not be on the winning side. It is stability in that sense which is the key to security. We may talk about all the other elements, but without that conviction, and without the flow of intelligence that follows from it, there is no prospect of success.
In this respect, there has been a dramatic change as a result of the policy announced three weeks ago, and reinforced by the right hon. Gentleman today, that for the foreseeable future there is an end to experimentation, to new initiatives and to constitution-mongering. The realisation that there will be no amnesty and the determination that in the foreseeable future Northern Ireland will be treated like any other part of the United Kingdom are the factors which bring that conviction and stability of outlook to the men and women of Northern Ireland and create an environment in which, in the long run, the IRA and terrorism cannot survive.
So, the flow of information will depend on public conviction that things will remain as they are, that there will be no let-up, no change, no pull-out, no surrender. But to whom will the information come? Who will receive this increased volume of information, the most deadly ammunition against the terrorists? I referred to the trinity—the police, the UDR, the Army. The Secretary of State could not be more right than when he used the phrase "The primacy of the police". It is the members of the police force, who belong to the people, are of the people and live amongst the people, who are the prime channel through which must come the information that will be deadly to the terrorists. So, the second

great change that has to come about is precisely this reassertion of the primacy of the police.
We were glad to learn that the strength of the RUC has now passed the 5,000 mark and that there will be no limitation on its going to the 6,500 mark. That is excellent; but that strength will be fully utilised only if the police are thereby enabled to get back on to the ground throughout the Province. There was a disastrous period—long before 1970— when the RUC was pulled back from one town after another, from one police station after another—pulled back out of contact with the people, pulled back from those very contacts which should now be developing as the channels of an increasing flow of crucial information. Not only must we have more RUC deployed throughout the Province, much as it was in years gone by. The whole operation has to be seen less as a military operation than as a police operation, and increasingly the UDR and the Army must be part of a strategy which is a police strategy because it is based upon tapping those resources and using those tactics which are essentially police resources and police tactics.
I wonder whether the rôle of the UDR has yet been properly thought out? I will not say that the UDR came into being haphazard, but it did come into being as an aftermath of the dissolution of the old B Specials. That is a tale which is told and a phase which has ended. But I do not believe we have fully defined the rôle to which the UDR has to be adapted and in which it will be recognised and must be accepted. I would define the rôle as that of a local frontier force—a force peculiar and unique, because this is the unique land frontier of the United Kingdom. I do not think it should be seen as a mere auxiliary to the Regular Army, although I do agree with the suggestion that a regular element in the UDR, a full-time element, would be of great value in stabilising its new rôle. The UDR has to be seen as part of what, in shorthand, I called the police operation.
I turn now to the Army. It sometimes seems to me—and of course I say this without any criticism or disloyalty to my own arm of the Service—that the Army in Northern Ireland—and perhaps especially in County Armagh, in my own


constituency and no doubt elsewhere— operates in a kind of vacuum, operates with notions which divide and separate it from the population amongst whom it is operating and upon whose outlook, in the last resort, success and failure must depend. That is why what my hon. Friend the Member for Antrim, North (Rev. Ian Paisley) said about the presence of the Army is so important. There is not yet sufficient understanding on the part of the Army of the mentality of the people and the environment in which they are operating. For that reason also I say that the Army, as well as the UDR, has to be fitted into a pattern which will be under the primacy of the police. The restoration of the primacy of the police, the reinforcement of that new pattern, the confidence that there is not going to be a change and that those who risk their lives by giving information are risking their lives for a cause which is going to prevail—these are the essentials of the security situation in Northern Ireland as we look ahead from the point we have reached.
I say once again to the right hon. Gentleman that what the Secretary of State wants to achieve will not be achieved unless we in the House—all of us—can find a more continuous and intensive way of exercising surveillance, asking questions and obtaining answers, and can thus be enabled to reassure those whom we represent and to whom our primary duty is owed. We have to devise ways in which that can be done better and better as the months go by.

7.13 p.m.

Sir Michael Havers: Not surprisingly, the question of security has dominated the debate. My contribution will be largely based on my experiences as a Law Officer in the last Administration and my frequent visits to Northern Ireland when in office. The Attorney-General has explained the ministerial responsibilities that the Law Officers have in Northern Ireland, particularly in relation to the Director of Public Prosecutions. The right hon. Gentleman explained the part played, sometimes by Law Officers alone and always in consultation with the DPP, on the question whether persons should be prosecuted. It is totally inconceivable that there should be any political influence upon the DPP

in Northern Ireland; in any case, he would not put up with it.
The decision to prosecute is only the first step. The case for the Crown must be proved, and in most cases this involves witnesses. That is where the first difficulty arises. The Attorney-General dealt with the comment by the solicitor in Belfast, reported in a number of English newspaper as well as those in Northern Ireland. But the difficulties of which that solicitor spoke—which he turned round as an attack on the security forces and the Government in seeking to mislead the courts and which I disagree with—the difficulties of a person charged with murder when the charge is dropped—is not unique to Northern Ireland; it happens in Great Britain. It happened recently, when a number of people were charged with terrorism but the charge was dropped because the evidence, when it was analysed, could not be satisfactorily put before the court.
There is an added problem in Northern Ireland, where witnesses sometimes cannot be persuaded to go into the witness box, even when their evidence would lead to the conviction of those charged. That difficulty is not usually experienced in the rest of the United Kingdom. It is a major difficulty.
I hope that the Government will consider again the question of anonymity for some of those witnesses. In this country, when a court is satisfied that the disclosure of a name and address may lead to the witness being penalised in some way, anonymity is allowed. That happens in cases involving sexual matters, and where there might be a threat to a witness. Anonymity is not preserved so often in Northern Ireland.
I have recently discussed with the Attorney-General the two cases that he named. It seems to me that they were cases in which the evidence available did not justify proceedings being taken. How can the position be improved? I would like to see urgent consideration given to the offence of committing an act of terrorism. The Attorney-General has courteously explained why he cannot be in the Chamber.
We have spent long enough thinking about this matter. It has been raised on a number of occasions, not only by Lord Gardiner. My suggestion would seem


to provide a quick and effective solution. It should be an offence that is common to the whole of the United Kingdom. It is desirable to have unanimity throughout the United Kingdom on criminal law. A separate law for Northern Ireland should be the exception rather than the rule. The offence of terrorism could be easily applied to the whole of the United Kingdom and would be of equal benefit to those concerned in dealing with terrorism here as it would be in Belfast, but there are complications in the absence of an offence of terrorism. For example, if a bomb factory is discovered—and it may not be more than a room, in which devices needed for making bombs are found, such as wiring, timing apparatus, detonators and explosives—and no connection with an actual explosion can be satisfactorily proved to enable it to be presented to a court, the only prosecution that can succeed is one under the Explosive Substances Act. The maximum in that case is 14 years. I am afraid that in the present climate of terrorism that maximum is quite inadequate.
In terrorism, we have also a multiplicity of different crimes—bombing, shooting, kidnapping, incitement to vielence, possessing explosives and many others—all of them concerned with terrorist activities. An indictment in those circumstances contains a number of different counts, relating to different Acts of Parliament, where, in one case, the burden of truth may shift from the prosecution to the defendant, making very difficult the task of the presiding judge in summing up to a jury in this country. If we had an offence of terrorism covering all those, the simplicity that would follow would make the task of all those concerned very much easier.
Proof of membership of the IRA is another problem that is becoming more and more difficult. I agree with the Secretary of State that the system in the Republic cannot be acceptable, not only because of the difference between a police force which is virtually totally accepted by all the citizens of the Republic— unlike what might be the position in the Province—but also because any witness can say to a court "I can assure you that this man is a member of the IRA" without being challenged about the sources of his information. That is a position which I should resent ever seeing over here.
If we were ever in a position in which a very strong dictatorship-type Government of either party were in power, it would also provide an excuse for them to develop that later on.
But something must be done. The evidence that is likely to prove membership of the IRA quite often will be the boasting of the man concerned. Once that is proved, it is for him to say "I was only boasting, and I did not mean it". But we come back to the same difficulty. He will usually boast before people who will not be prepared to go into the witness box.

Mr. Orme: I have no doubt that the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows that in the Republic, when people were charged with this offence and they would not recognise the court, it was a simple matter to proceed. But, increasingly, people are challenging this in court, and it is very difficult to prove in a court of law.

Sir M. Havers: I agree. It is one of the difficulties. I am not sure what can be done.
Various alternatives have been discussed. There is no point in my mentioning them, but in the end they all suffer from the same difficulty, that the evidence put before the court cannot be challenged and examined, or even given by those who have to speak of their own knowledge and, therefore, can be cross-examined.
After the basic difficulties existing because of the problem of evidence, we have the position where, in my view, the rule of law can only be respected and be effective if it is not only accepted by society as a whole but also successfully supported by the security forces and ultimately the courts. This means that the detection rate must be high, that the conviction rate must be high, and that the sentences must be fair and just, not only to the accused but to society as a whole.
The security forces must feel that the Government are doing all that they can to help them in their task, including— this is why it is so important that the most urgent consideration be given to the creation of an offence of terrorism— ensuring them that everything is being done to make the necessary offences available to deal with terrorism.
Perhaps this debate has shown a number of ways in which the rule of law, which we all agree is vital, can be made more effective in Northern Ireland.

7.23 p.m.

The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. Stanley Orme): This has been a wide-ranging debate. It has been not only about security and the economy but about direct rule as well—or perhaps I ought to say the continuation of the present phase of direct rule. In effect, direct rule has been with us since 1972. We had a period of the Executive in between, but direct rule almost since 1972——

Mr. Powell: Since 1800.

Mr. Orme: We will not argue about what the devolved government was before that. Some of us might say that that was a form of independence within the United Kingdom or part independence within the United Kingdom. Nevertheless, we are now in a new political situation, and we have to face that.
From an economic point of view, it is a very difficult time, and I shall comment on that in a moment. But first I want to refer to one matter which several hon. Members raised, and it concerned the army being seen in such areas as South Armagh, South Derry and so on. My right hon. Friend gave some figures about vehicle check points and about the work that the Army has done. Sometimes the Army is operating far more efficiently when it is not being seen than when it is being seen.
Some of the stupid statements, such as those made by Mr. Harry West and others, have not helped the Army. Our troops are extremely annoyed about this type of criticism. They make no complaint about criticisms made in this House, but they do when it comes from people in Northern Ireland who keep talking about loyalty and criticising the Army which is there to defend the Province and both its communities.
Constructive criticism such as that which we have had from the hon. Member for Abingdon (Mr. Neave), the right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell) and the hon. Member for Antrim, North (Rev. Ian Paisley), is another matter entirely. We have to discuss these matters, but no one person has

the total answer or the native knowledge of people who understand the situation, which can be of immense value. I am sure that Irish Members in this House impart that information already to the British Army, to the RUC and to the UDR because they are in contact with commanders at local and regional level.
I come to the question which the hon. Member for Abingdon asked my right hon. Friend about talks. My right hon. Friend has made it clear that it will be his intention to explain to both sides what Government policy is. He stands by that. There will be no negotiation. He has made it clear that the security forces will respond to violence which exists. The IRA created its own ceasefire. That has had nothing to do with the increased rate of arrests and conviction of members of the Provisional IRA during the period that we are discussing. In fact, the successes in this regard are more outstanding today than they were only a few months ago.

Mr. Neave: What is the point of saying that the cease-fire still exists, in the circumstances?

Mr. Orme: We have no jurisdiction over this. It has never been our ceasefire. We do not see that any cease-fire, in a negotiated sense, exists. It has never been negotiated. The Provisional IRA said that it had a cease-fire, but we have seen what has happened recently and the actions that it has taken.
We are not defending a cease-fire. For us, the security forces are operating at the highest level. If some people say that they have a cease-fire and others say that they have not, that has no effect on Government policy. I hope that that makes the position quite clear.
The right hon. and learned Member for Wimbledon (Sir M. Havers) will be aware that the Government are examining the proposal that he put forward, and I shall draw to the attention of my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General what he said tonight about it.
I come, then, to the issue of the economy and to the frontal attack made upon the Government by the hon. Member for Armagh (Mr. McCusker). I understand that, quite rightly, he feels aggrieved about unemployment and that he is critical of certain decisions, not least the defence decision taken last week.
The impression was given to the House that Northern Ireland is running down hill, out of control. Nothing could be further from the truth. Having been in this job for over two years, perhaps it is almost time for me to look back over that period and to consider what has been attempted, against the background of a five-fold increase in the price of oil. This increase played a major part in transport costs. The right hon. Member for Down, South has referred to it. It has affected the costs of electricity and internal transport, and added to the peripheral problems.
It was said that during the early 1960s Northern Ireland was beginning to take a fresh look at the economic situation and beginning to come out of what had been a fairly consistently low level of activity. I can remember going to Northern Ireland 10 or 12 years ago. It reminded me of the area of Lancashire in which I was brought up in the 1930s. It looked depressed. It was depressed. The people were depressed. There was not just a lack of will at that time but a feeling that nothing could be done about it. But changes were made, and because of the changed situation, increasing investment came into Northern Ireland.
It has to be said to the hon. Member for Armagh that much of the Government intervention and activity has come in the last six or seven years, during the period of the crisis. The previous Administration created the Finance Corporation which, if I may say so, is a forerunner of the concept of the National Enterprise Board. The previous Administration did that because they realised that public investment would have to be made, as well as encouraging private investment. We then saw the creation of training facilities, and new industries came into Northern Ireland. Thirty-three American companies came in, and nine of them have increased their investment since 1969. Despite the violence, there was a feeling that Northern Ireland industry could survive and that the violence had in a sense not affected industry.
When I was in the United States I was reminded about the Ulster workers' strike. During the week I spent in the United States, 10 Protestant workers returning from a factory were lined up against a bus and brutally murdered. I was at that time speaking to a multinational company in Chicago. Hour by hour, news

of the atrocity was plastered all over the United States, and they said to me, "Mr. Orme, are you saying that violence does not come into industry in Northern Ireland?" That is the kind of background against which we have to operate, and all of us who are opposed to violence, and want to see a stable society, have to try to overcome these problems.
Despite these difficulties, I put the case for investment. I quoted the productivity figures. Since 1969 productivity in Great Britain has risen by about 22 per cent. In Northern Ireland it has risen by nearly 27 per cent. There is no longer a cheap wage economy. The trade unions have played a part in that. Labour is no longer cheap. In certain industries it is dearer in Northern Ireland than in parts of Great Britain.
Many things have changed, and all this has been done against the background of a great dependence on agriculture. About 10 per cent. of the people in Northern Ireland are involved in agriculture, as opposed to just under 3 per cent. in Great Britain. There used to be a great dependence on the traditional textile industry. Now man-made fibres have come in.
A few nights ago I was at a function where I talked to the chairman of one of the major companies in the United Kingdom, with a major interest in Northern Ireland. I told him that we are reexamining the whole question of how to attract industry. I asked him why he went to Northern Ireland. The reason is that the Government incentives are much better than in any other part of the United Kingdom. Proper account should be taken of that fact.
The shipbuilding industry—an old industry in the technological sense—is facing a world crisis. Under this Administration and the previous one, we have collectively put about £119 million into one shipyard. This is not an investment also covering Scotland, the North-East and Merseyside. This is the sum put into one shipyard, in an endeavour to save jobs.
I take note of what was said about Short Brothers and Harland. Certainly the Government are constrained to maintain a healthy firm. I take note also of the comments of the hon. Member for Belfast, South concerning missiles, and


so on, but this is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Minister of Defence.
Despite this background, the economy improved, and unemployment went down, under this Government, to under 6 per cent. Then it was knocked for six, not by the indolence of the Government but by the world economic crisis, by the recession. Any investment which might then have come in, ceased. In fact, the reverse took place, and a number of firms, some multinational and some publicly owned—no differentiation can be made here—started to rationalise and to pull back.
This is one of the problems of being on the periphery, whether it is in Scotland, on Merseyside or in Northern Ireland. When companies begin to rationalise, they cut the overheads and costs involved in having long arms of communciation, trying to bring everything back into a central unit. That is the sort of difficulty we have had to face in relation to Rolls-Royce and Standard Telephones & Cables Ltd.
Against that sort of background we must consider how to proceed if we are not to lose a great deal of private investment in Northern Ireland. I do not go round like a Jonah. I try to sell Northern Ireland. I try to convince people that there is a future there. Most of the industrialists there will stay. There is a great argument—the Government are central to it—between private and public investment. The fact is that Northern Ireland cannot exist as a modern industrial part of the United Kingdom without substantial public investment. That is the key to it.
This is where the Northern Ireland Development Agency comes into the picture. The Order will come before the House next Thursday at about ten o'clock. We shall debate it then and I shall be able to announce some of the appointments that I have already made to that body. There will be Northern Ireland people on it, and that will give it the stature and importance that it deserves. It will have £50 million at its disposal. That is a substantial sum for an area the size of Northern Ireland. I look forward to that developing in the future——

Rev. Ian Paisley: Can the Minister give us any information about the attitude now to service industries—we have raised this with him before—rather than manufacturing industries?

Mr. Orme: The hon. Gentleman's intervention leads me nicely to my next point about the major study. The Government give industrial grants and assistance to manufacturing industry. They are not precluded from giving it to the service industries, but there are great difficulties in giving it to them. I can quote the classic example of a car showroom. A salesman, whom the hon. Gentleman knows, came to see me. He did not employ many people, and he took them on as and how he wanted. Unfortunately he went into liquidation, but someone else was able to pick up the business because he wanted to sell the cars. It was unlike the loss of a manufacturing concern. That sort of matter can be considered frankly and openly in the study.
What sort of questions should we be asking about the Northern Ireland economy? I believe that we should be asking ourselves whether we are organised in the right way in terms of the Department of Commerce and Manpower, and the Northern Ireland Development Agency. Are we going for the right industries and products? Should we alter the balance between manufacturing and service industries? Do we pay enough attention to small local industries? Can we do more to stimulate private investment, or should we go for more State industry? Are we carrying out the correct training? Are we using good marketing to make the most of what we have? Is industrial promotion concentrated in the right places abroad? These are the sort of questions which will be examined by the Government.
Perhaps I may make a slight correction to something I said on Monday night as reported at column 155 of the Official Report. I said that I would be chairing the inquiry. The inquiry will be chaired by Dr. Quigley, the head of the Manpower Department, with the assistance of senior officials in Northern Ireland and Westminster. The Committee will be answerable to me as the Minister, but I shall not be chairing it personally. Representations may be made to the Government to be passed on to the Committee.
An economist said to me the other week that one of the problems of Northern Ireland was that there were too many people. I told him that the problem was that we have too little industry of the right type, and that if we could only broaden the economic base we could make Northern Ireland viable.

Mr. Bradford: I was interested to hear what the Minister of State said about the NIDA, and we look forward to the debate. Will the right hon. Gentleman clarify one point about the finance for Shorts? I may have misunderstood him, but he seemed to suggest that the future of that establishment was to some extent a matter for the Secretary of State for Defence. Is it not the case that the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland advances the moneys which are required at the given time?

Mr. Orme: I was charged by one hon. Member with selling Northern Ireland short. We already have our difficulties in Northern Ireland, and if we are not careful we shall start talking the sound companies into trouble. There is no problem about the missile side. Hon. Members must not start talking in this way. With that attitude the best companies can be destroyed in a difficult economic climate. We must have confidence, certainly in the whole of the United Kingdom, and not least in Northern Ireland. Someone made a completely false statement last week about Shorts. When we checked we found that he had made the statement because, he said, "that will put the wind up the Government". But he was putting the wind up 5,000 people whose jobs could be put in jeopardy by a clever person who thought that he was playing politics with the Government when he was playing with Northern Ireland jobs.
I have been asked about economic withdrawal and sanctions. The public expenditure figures are an indication that we shall not have economic sanctions. The Government would not be putting more money into Northern Ireland than they are putting into the other parts of the United Kingdom if they were planning economic sanctions or withdrawal. We have to use our existing resources, and that is why they must be re-examined. We must secure stability in Northern Ireland. If we are to create the conditions in which

political advancement is more certain we must move towards full employment, with people in decent homes and a decent environment free from violence. Employment is a crucial factor within that compilation.
I know how the people in Northern Ireland feel. They have expressed their views to me extremely forcibly. I have explained Government policy and I have told them that there is no easy way, no simple answer to the problem. The Government are concerned about it and proof of that concern is shown by our application in trying to find solutions.
The right hon. Member for Down, South asked about a Select Committee, and I fear that I may have given him perhaps a curt answer. The Secretary of State is concerned that a Committee which could call for people and papers might compromise the security forces. He will not have the Army or other security forces sent for and interrogated in this way. That cannot be allowed. Perhaps there is some way of overcoming this problem, and we shall look at it, but I can enter into no firm commitment on this point.

Mr. Powell: None of us expected the Minister to make a firm commitment tonight. We are obliged to him for indicating that the question is open. There are ways and means by which one can make sure, even with the most searching Select Committee procedure, that the interrogation does not expose what should not in the public interest be exposed. It was certainly not in the minds of my hon. Friend and myself that this Committee should be an instrument for embarrassing or hampering the security forces —rather the reverse, that it could be used to reinforce public support for them.

Mr. Orme: It was not the right hon. Gentleman's proposal or the thinking behind it that concerned the Government. We have had some experience in Northern Ireland of how people get hold of ideas and how, before we know where we are, the ideas spread and the wrong interpretations are put upon them. That sort of thing can be extremely damaging. Of course, I accept the right hon. Gentleman's clarification.
The debate has covered the central issues of security, the economy and the continuation of direct rule. These three


factors are paramount in the advancement of Northern Ireland. I hope that we have been able to show tonight that the Government know the direction they are taking on security and employment. They have not got the simple answers, because there is none. I believe, however, after two years of daily involvement in this situation, that the climate can be created in Northern Ireland which will lead to far better things. Unfortunately many of my constituents do not believe that. We have to show them that they are wrong, because Northern Ireland is at stake in this situation.

Mr. Donald Coleman (Lord Commissioner of the Treasury): I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

LEGAL AID AND ADVICE (SCOTLAND)

7.50 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Harry Ewing): I beg to move,
That the Legal Aid (Scotland) (Extension of Proceedings) Regulations 1976, a copy of which was laid before this House on 10th March, be approved.
The purpose of these Regulations is to extend legal aid to the Employment Appeal Tribunal which was established by the Employment Protection Act 1975 and which will come into operation on 30th March this year. Regulations which extend legal aid require affirmative resolutions of each House before they can come into operation.
The Appeal Tribunal will be a superior court of record, whose main function will be to hear appeals on points of law from industrial tribunals and from the certification officer. Most of the jurisdiction of the Appeal Tribunal is at present being exercised in Scotland by the Court of Session, where legal aid is available. It is therefore plainly desirable for legal aid to be available for proceedings in the Employment Appeal Tribunal, and I accordingly commend these Regulations to the House. Their effect will be to continue to make legal aid available in cases where it is already available, and they will therefore add little or nothing to the financial burden on the Legal Aid Fund.

7.51 p.m.

Lord James Douglas-Hamilton: The Opposition accept and welcome this measure. We believe that legal aid should be made available in this case. In doing so, we note that the cost is stated to be between £50,000 and £75,000, and we note particularly that this Statutory Instrument relates to Scotland alone and is not an extension of present categories. Indeed, I think that it is worth mentioning that the level of entitlement to legal aid would be that of a person who earns not more than £1,790, and that the entitlement is to be determined by a committee of lawyers. Therefore, this is one case in which the lawyers concerned will be saving the State both the cost and the extra bureaucracy which would otherwise be required. I hope that that point will


be borne in mind by the Government, the Royal Commission and all those who seek to criticise lawyers.

Question put and agreed to.

COAL INDUSTRY

8.2 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for Energy (Mr. Alex Eadie): I beg to move,
That the Coal Industry (Redundancy Payments Schemes) (Extension) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 17th March, be approved.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Oscar Murton): Unless there is any objection, with this Order the House may discuss the other motions relating to the coal industry, as follows:
That the Coking Coal Grants (Extension) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 17th March, be approved.
That the National Coal Board (Pit Closures Grants) (Extension) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 17th March, be approved.
That the National Coal Board (Stocking Grants) (Extension) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 17th March, be approved.
That the Redundant Mineworkers and Concessionary Coal (Payments Schemes) (Amendment) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 17th March, be approved.

Mr. Eadie: A total of five Orders, all connected with the coal industry, have been laid before the House for approval. Of these three are concerned with the benefits paid to reundant mineworkers. The other two relate to grants, in connection with coal and coke stocks and the production and supply of coking coal.
Although we all sincerely believe that the sort of colliery closure programmes we saw in the late 1960s and early 1970s have gone for ever, mining is an extractive industry, its working medium is constantly changing, and from time to time pits will inevitably have to close because reserves have become exhausted or grossly uneconomic. Where possible the men displaced from the closing pits are found work in continuing ones, but, unfortunately, this cannot always cover all the men, and some have to be made redundant—and miners made redundant in this way will continue to have special problems. Many of them live in isolated

colliery villages where alternative employment is just not available. The older ones find it difficult to adapt to other work or, after a lifetime of work in a harsh environment, may be sick or maimed.
The Government have therefore thought it right to continue for a further period the arrangements which have been in existence since the middle 1960s for paying benefit to men who find themselves in these unfortunate circumstances.
One of the Orders for the consideration of the House is the National Coal Board (Pit Closures Grants) (Extension) Order 1976. Under the Coal Industry Act 1965, as amended by subsequent legislation, the Government are empowered to make grants to the National Coal Board
with the object of accelerating the re-deployment of the manpower resources of the Board".
The grants are in respect of certain items of what the Act calls "relevant expenditure ". These are defined in the Act, and the main ones are: payments by the Board under the Redundancy Payments Act; payments in respect of loss of employment prospects and the cost of early retirement for those redundants who are members of the Board's staff superannuation scheme; payment of removal and resettlement expenses and travelling allowances for men who are redeployed within the industry; and supplementation of earnings of men re-employed in a lower-paid job.
The average cost to the Board of these payments is about £21 million a year and the Government pay a grant of half this—about £10·5 million. Some of these payments also attract grants from the European Coal and Steel Community, totalling about £2 million a year.
The 1973 Act empowered the Government to make payments up to the financial year 1975–76, with a limit of £60 million. It also gave the Secretary of State power, by Order, to extend the period of operation up to and including the financial year 1977–78. It is this extension of the powers to make payments up to March 1978 which the Government are seeking in asking the House to approve the National Coal Board (Pit Closures Grants) (Extension) Order 1976. If the Order is made a revised ceiling of £100 million automatically applies for


the five financial years 1973–74 to 1977–78.
I understand that the Select Committee on Statutory Instruments criticised the absence of any mention of the revised financial limits in these Orders or the Explanatory Notes. I apologise to the House for this omission. It was certainly my intention to explain the new limits, as I have just done. They follow automatically from the extension of time and it is all set out in the relevant sections of the 1973 Act. However, we shall certainly bear the Select Committee's point in mind in any future Orders.
I turn now to the Coal Industry (Redundancy Payments Schemes) (Extension) Order 1976. This has its origins in the Coal Industry Act 1967, which empowered the Secretary of State to make schemes under which he would make payments to men redundant at a mine or certain other prescribed places such as workshops or coal preparation plants. Subsequent Acts have extended the duration of this power. Most recently, the Coal Industry Act 1973 extended it to 28th March 1976, and provided that a further extension to 26th March 1978 could be made by order. In that case there would be a revised ceiling of £100 million for the five financial years 1973–74 to 1977–78. The present limit is £60 million. It is this extension that we are seeking the agreement of the House to by approving the Coal Industry (Redundancy Payments Schemes) (Extension) Order 1976.
The next Order concerns the Redundancy Payment Schemes, which can be made under the Order that I have just described. A scheme was originally established under the Redundant Mine-workers Payments Scheme Order of 1968. This has been amended and extended from time to time, and a major revision was carried out in 1973.
The main features of the Scheme are, first, in the case of men redundant at 55 or over, to supplement the man's income from other State benefits so as to make it up to 90 per cent. of his previous net pay for three years, and thereafter, until he reaches the age of 65, to pay him a sum equal to the current rate of unemployment benefit plus his normal mine-workers pension paid prematurely; secondly, in the case of men redundant between age 35 and 55, to pay a lump

sum depending on each man's length of service; thirdly, to extend, at Government expense, the National Coal Board's concessionary coal arrangements to men redundant at 55 or over.
So far 69,000 men have benefited from the Scheme, at a total cost of some £70 million. The current cost is running at about £18 million annually. The Scheme attracts a grant of about £2 million annually from the European Coal and Steel Community.
The existing Scheme covers only men made redundant up to 28th March 1976. The next Order before the House—the Redundant Mineworkers and Concessionary Coal (Payments Schemes) (Amendment) Order 1976—extends the 1973 Order so as to include men made redundant up to, but not including, 26th March 1978. It also makes some technical amendments in the definitions and provides a new table of benefit. The rates of benefit set out in Appendix 4 in the 1973 Order are calculated by deducting the rate of unemployment benefit from the figures which represent 90 per cent, of net pay. These rates therefore have to be adjusted whenever the level of unemployment benefit changes, and this is what we are doing in the new table in the Schedule to the Order now under discussion.
I therefore ask the approval of the House to the Redundant Mineworkers and Concessionary Coal (Payments Schemes) (Amendment) Order 1976. I emphasise that this amending Order makes absolutely no changes in the benefits under the 1973 Order, except for this necessary adjustment of basic benefit.
The remaining two Orders extend existing powers which were provided under the Coal Industry Act 1973 for the Government to provide assistance to the coal industry. The first is with the National Coal Board (Stocking Grants) (Extension) Order. Coal production cannot be turned on and off like a tap, and when consumption is not sufficient to absorb current production coal has to be put to stock. This process costs money. Section 7 of the 1973 Act empowered the Secretary of State to make grants to the National Coal Board towards costs incurred in the financial years 1973–74 to 1975–76 in stocking coal or coke. These consist of the interest on additional borrowings needed to finance the stocks of


coal or coke, the site costs—preparation, rent, where necessary, and so on—and the costs of handling the coal into and out of stock.
Originally, this power to pay grants related only to stocks actually owned by the Board. But it also delivers stocks to major customers on deferred payment, and in these cases, though ownership of the stocks passes to the customers, the Board nevertheless has to cover the cost of financing the stocks until payment is made. It is sensible for the Board to keep stocks moving from the pithead and for the coal to be stocked with its final consumers, and it is equally sensible that there should be power to assist the Board to meet the costs it incurs in financing these stocks.
The National Coal Board (Finance) Act, which recently received Royal Assent, widened the Secretary of State's power to pay grant so as to include coal stocked with the Central Electricity Board, the South of Scotland Electricity Board and the British Steel Corporation under these deferred payment arrangements.
The National Coal Board (Stocking Grants) (Extension) Order, now in draft before the House, is made under Section 7 of the 1973 Act, and its purpose is to extend these powers in relation to the stocking of coal for a further two years— that is, to March 1978. The limit of grants payable will automatically increase from £40 million to £70 million. So far, £4·9 million has been paid to the Board for these purposes.
The second Order relating to assistance to the coal industry is the Coking Coal Grants (Extension) Order. This relates to Section 8 of the 1973 Act, which empowered the Secretary of State to make grants to the National Coal Board or any other producer of coking coal used to make coke for the blast furnaces of the iron and steel industry. Coking coal is generally likely to be in short supply in the whole of the free world over the foreseeable future. We are fortunately able to produce most of our own requirements, and though some of it comes from high-cost pits we need to make sure that capacity is maintained.
The existing powers in Section 8 of the 1973 Act to support production of coking coal cover us only to the end of the

current financial year, so this Order will extend them over the financial years 1976–77 and 1977–78. Under the terms of Section 8 the limit for such grants is automatically increased from £45 million to £75 million. To date, £22·1 million has been paid to the Board under this heading.
In the Coal Industry Examination the Government undertook to be ready to provide short-term assistance to the industry, especially in those cases where a product may be essential in the national interest. Both of these Orders will preserve the necessary flexibility for the Government to assist the industry in its operations in a national and European context.
I stress that in the case of both Orders what is at issue is an enabling permissive power. As the House will understand, commitment to actual expenditure is taken only with the approval of the Treasury and after the Board's financial position, the state of the market, and all the other necessary factors have been taken into full account.
It is with full confidence in the essential nature of the measures I have outlined that I ask the House to give its approval to these five Orders.

8.8 p.m.

Mr. Patrick McNair-Wilson: As the Minister explained, these Orders flow from the 1973 Conservative legislation on the coal industry. Although they are extension Orders, it is right that we should examine some of the points the Minister made and seek to clear up some of the points that have not been made.
This debate takes place against a background this week of much news about the coal industry. We have had an unseemly situation of a new search being made in public for a Chairman of the National Coal Board, an unfortunate and humiliating state of affairs for us all to see. I hope that the day will come when chairmen of nationalised industries are treated not like Ministers' office boys but with the dignity one hopes they will be able to enjoy to enable them to undertake their job properly.
Today we have seen publication of the agenda for the National Union of Mine-workers' annual conference in the Isle of Man in July. Many of the matters we are now discussing will be discussed later in


the year. Early retirement, the effect on the costs of the Board, and redundancy are on the agenda. That conference, which asks for higher wages for miners, will be a conference of great significance to the industry.
I wish to comment briefly on a number of points made. I do not want to go over all the old ground because the Minister has been fair in his explanation of the situation. I wish to take first the National Coal Board (Pit Closures Grants) (Extension) Order, which in a sense is central to all the Orders laid before us. The fact is that in the 1965 Act powers were given with the object of accelerating redeployment of manpower resources of the Board and the elimination of uneconomic colliery capacity. I am advised that in 1973–74 £12·7 million was spent under this provision, that in 1974–75 £13·8 million was spent, and that approximately £14 million is the likely outturn for 1976.
It is well known and often stated that the NUM resists the closure of pits when proposed on purely economic grounds. But, with the arrival in the near future of major new coal-bearing areas—I am thinking of the Selby field and other finds which are being discovered—what is the general policy on closures? Will the figure of £14 million for 1976 jump substantially when these new coal-bearing areas come into production?
What criteria will be used to determine which pits should be closed? After all, it is within our recollection that a few weeks ago there was justifiable worry and concern over the closure of Langwith colliery. Will the Minister reiterate what the criteria are or are likely to be for closures in future? Will he indicate whether the policy in the industry is to base future coal production only on these major new finds or to keep in being, as one might guess should be the case, some of the pits which are marginal in performance?
I turn now to the Coal Industry (Redundancy Payments Schemes) (Extension) Order and that part of the Redundant Mineworkers and Concessionary Coal (Payments Schemes) (Amendment) Order which deals with redundancy. The Under-Secretary has given the figure of £21 million as the cost of the

scheme. Is it possible for him to give any indication of the numbers who are likely to be declared redundant—I have already referred to the point regarding early retiring age which is to be discussed at the NUM conference—since a number of people are taking early redundancy? Part of the scheme is designed to adjust the rate of benefit in step with changes in unemployment benefit. We fully understand that. Nevertheless, I should like to know—I am sure that everybody else would like to know—what the predicted figures are, whether the figure given by the Under-Secretary is a low figure for the future against the background of the changing pattern of redundancy in the industry, and whether people are taking early redundancy.
The second part of the last Order deals with concessionary coal. The hon. Gentleman touched on that matter. This might be described by some as a small matter, but it presents an extremely confused picture. We know that concessionary coal agreements are local agreements. There is no national agreement. The present scheme costs about £33 million. I am not querying or quarrelling with that figure. If we divide it among the 245,000 or 246,000 people in the industry who are entitled to enjoy this benefit, it works out at about £2·50 per person. But we want a few answers about the way in which this concession is granted.
The Under-Secretary knows that, with the spread of smokeless zones—smoke-controlled areas—there are situations in which it is not possible to burn coal, and the obvious alternative is a smokeless fuel. There are also situations— regrettably, this is a point to which I shall have to return later regarding stocks—in which there is no opportunity of burning anything in a grate, because there are no flues in the buildings concerned.
We are getting towards a situation in which, as I see it, there will be three levels of recipients of concessionary benefit. There will be those who take the coal, those who take the Sunbrite, and those who take the allowance in lieu of either of those products because they have some other form of heating. If the payment is in cash, presumably no tax is paid. If, on the other hand, it is paid in some other way, tax is levied on the concession.

Mr. John Biffen: It is the other way round.

Mr. McNair-Wilson: My hon. Friend corrects me. It is the other way round.
I wonder whether this concession now needs looking at afresh with a view to considering whether we may get some national agreement on what is, after all, one of the perks of the industry. I am not quarrelling about perks in industry. Many industries have perks. However, it is important to have a scheme which is seen to be fair to all who are likely to be recipients, whether working for it or as dependants.

Mr. Fred Evans: I think that there is a fourth category—widows —who cannot translate bituminous coal into smokeless fuel and cannot draw payment in lieu. They have to take coal which is unsuitable for modern fireplaces.

Mr. McNair-Wilson: That is an extremely important category. I would add widows to the list of those about whom I should welcome comments from the Under-Secretary.
The changing nature of the way that we can or cannot burn coal leads to the stocking Order. I am advised that by the end of 1977 we shall have stocks of between 25 million tons ard 26 million tons. That will cost about £350 million, which is a great deal of money. It costs about 50p per ton to put coal into stock. Therefore, it is in everybody's interests to get the stocks down as much and as quickly as possible.
I am not suggesting that the stock figures are as horrific as is sometimes made out by those who try to point out that the high level of stocks is destroying morale in the industry. Nevertheless, today perhaps more than ever, when the fall in the international value of sterling has increased our oil import bill by about £250 million a year, the need to use this precious indigenous resource is very strong. Therefore, I should like the Under-Secretary to tell us what plans there are to go back to a reasonable export trade in this product. In the past we had a strong export position of about 13 million tons a year. That sank away to 2 million tons, and is now about 4 million tons.
It never fails to sicken me—I make no apology for repeating this—that 30 per cent. of all coal imported by the EEC comes from Iron Curtain countries. With the United Kingdom as a member of the EEC, it is not good enough. I know that the Under-Secretary is doing his best in this area, but I should be interested to know about his situation report on our export programme.
The domestic market is comparatively small. I still have a living fire in my house and I enjoy it very much.

Mr. Adam Hunter: Hear, hear.

Mr. McNair-Wilson: I am glad to have the hon. Gentleman's support.
Regrettably, houses now built by local authorities do not have flues. Therefore, it is impossible for the domestic market to grow in many areas. I wonder what success the Under-Secretary is having in persuading his right hon. Friends in the Department of the Environment and elsewhere to ensure that houses are built with flues so that we can use coal, the solid hydrocarbon, in our homes and not be dependent upon gas, with all the problems which revolve round its current price, or oil, which is still largely imported. The hon. Gentleman knows, because I have spoken to him about it, that some of my constituents who live in local authority-owned properties have been horrified at having to be converted from solid fuel to gas. If we want to get that market up we have to take another look at the regulations concerning council housing.
Not all stocks attract Government grants and, as the Minister pointed out, the figures are mercifully not very high. I believe I am correct in saying that only stocks above 10 million tons attract Government money. Nevertheless, the Order we are passing here this evening is worth another £3 million to add to the other figures I have given. The Under-Secretary has told us the story about coking coal, and provided we continue, as we seem likely to do, with the blast furnace for making iron, we shall need that support. But this group of Orders taken together add up to more than £100 million.
I am the first—and I have always been consistent in this—to want to see a modern and efficient coal industry. I have


backed it ever since I came into this House and I intend to go on doing so. But the fact also remains that there are taxpayers who wonder occasionally whether we do not spend rather too much time concerning ourselves with those employed in the industry and not enough on those who are customers of the industry. That is a complaint which all hon. Members have heard and it is one which we have to meet head on.
Up to 1973 the coal industry in this country struggled, not suprisingly unsuccessfully, to compete with cheap oil from the Middle East. No coal miner in Britain could dig coal cheaper than oil coming from the ground at 15 cents. a barrel. After 1973 the coal industry has still kept a relationship with the oil business, but a different relationship. Now it is a question of watching the OPEC price and tailoring the coal industry to what that price does. I suggest that that could be a dangerous course to follow for too long and that we must soon be coming to the point where the industry must be prepared to strike out on its own and to realise that there are big markets, whether they be in continental Europe or anywhere else, for the product at the right price.
I do not suggest going back to the kind of coal industry which led to so many of the terrible stories with which one is familiar, but I am saying that this industry should stop limping along behind OPEC and should be prepared to stand on its own feet, and, if it can, to get its costs down and thereby to increase its market. Therefore, if these Orders help the industry to set this pace, I can assure the Minister that we on this side of the House will not oppose them.

8.24 p.m.

Mr. Eric Ogden: The House will know most of those hon. Members in the industry who have taken part in coal debates and will know of their particular interest. I gather that even though there is a Register in effect, it is still necessary to declare one's interest. I do so right away, as others have done before, and speak as a member of the National Union of Mine-workers.
I support all five of the Orders but I propose to comment on only two. First, on the Order concerning concessionary

coal, I never really appreciated the 10 cwt. of coal that used to come into my house every month for 12 years until after I had come to this House. Now, when I pay £12·60 for 5 cwt, of anthracite stovesse nuts—and I will not mention the name of the supplier—I appreciate more and more the concessionary coal which I used to receive. This is a very valuable part of being a member of the coal industry.
I would ask my hon. Friend some questions on the Stocking Grants Order. It is certainly necessary and desirable that there should be adequate stocks of coal. This is an industrial insurance policy. Moving coal and stocking coal can be a very expensive business. I wonder whether in the Department any calculations have been made or any alternative suggestions are being considered, and whether it might be much cheaper for the taxpayer and the fuel industries—coal, electricity and gas—if we were to persuade the Central Electricity Generating Board to burn more coal and to stock more oil. I would think it simpler to stock oil and less costly than stocking coal.
I am not suggesting that that can be done in every part of the United Kingdom, but if those calculations were to be made as a cost benefit analysis—a horrible phrase—they might bring some interesting results which would save the taxpayer money and would save the Electricity Board and the National Coal Board very large sums of money, for, as the hon. Member for New Forest (Mr. McNair-Wilson) pointed out, very large sums indeed are involved.
The hon. Member also said that perhaps there is a danger that we are giving too much attention to the employees in the industry—the workers—and too little attention to the customers. There may be a very, very slight danger of that, but he will know that this is an historical industry. Coal cannot be separated from its past, and certainly the history of the coal mining industry, the fact that too much attention for 250 years was given to the customers and almost none to the workers, is something which we have to bear in mind at all times.
I agree with him that uncertainty about the present Chairman of the National Coal Board is unnecessary and undesirable and that this is something which


ought to be cleared up. In the Press reports, the headlines were very different from their content. This may be an example of some parts of a Department or some parts of an industry "flying a kite". If this is so, the kite ought to be shot down in flames very quickly.
Some of my hon. Friends and I on this side of the House have been trying to do just that, and I suggested to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House this afternoon that it would be appreciated if our right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Energy would come to the House at some time next week—he may not be quite as busy next week as he has been this week, or may be he will be even busier—to make a statement about the future of the Chairman of the industry. In my view, and that of other hon. Members—though I must make it clear that I do not speak for the group and have no mandate to do so; I am giving a personal opinion—there is absolutely no reason why the Chairman of the National Coal Board, who has done a great deal for the national interest and for the workers' interest, should not be offered another term as soon as possible. Let us get that out of the way so that detailed and general negotiations can take place among people inside the industry who know and trust each other.
Finally, I would put this series of Orders in the context of the series of Orders which came to the House last night and again today. It seems that at last there is some kind of change in Government policy which I personally welcome. For many years, under Governments of both parties, most aid for industry has been given almost on a geographical basis, depending on whether an industry was north or south of the border, in or out of an intermediate area, for example. That was a very broad band and an expensive way of dispensing taxpayer's money.
My hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell and Wishaw (Dr. Bray) said last night, when we discussed the financial assistance to be given to the BP acetic acid plant on Humberside, that if this had been done by means of a broad tax concession, the £10 million aid would have cost the Exchequer £75 million. We should also bear in mind in this context the financial aid to be given to the Felixstowe docks. Some hon. Members

may disagree with this but we now seem, I think with their agreement, to be selecting industries for this assistance rather than random geographical areas. Sometimes we back winners and sometimes we back concerns which are not quite winners—yet. If these Orders and the proposals for the BP plant and for Felixstowe mean that aid will go to specific industries, I welcome that change. Certainly no industry deserves more Government support than the coal industry, the base for our essential future requirements for fuel and energy.

8.30 p.m.

Mr. Ivan Lawrence: Before I give my approval to these Orders, I want to raise a matter that puzzles me. I have no interest to declare except that of being a taxpayer. I am puzzled about the provisions for concessionary coal.
Over the coming months, and, I guess, over the coming years, the utter absurdity of many of the implications of the Sex Discrimination Act which we have so recently passed will become even more manifest than they are already. Some have already been raised several times. One absurdity has appeared in connection with concessionary coal. My hon. Friend the Member for New Forest (Mr. McNair-Wilson) said that three levels of people receive the concessionary allowance—the ordinary coal concessionees, the Sunbright concessionees, and those who have money in lieu of the allowance. The hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Evans) added a fourth category—that of the widow. There is in fact a fifth.

Mr. Adam Hunter: The concession to widows does not apply in every part of the United Kingdom. It does in Scotland, but I understand that they get no concession in some parts of England.

Mr. Lawrence: Widows are a subcategory, if not a full category. I do not wish to join in any argument among Labour Members. I am happy to accept widows as a fourth category for the purposes of the argument.
There is a fifth category. I thought that my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest was coming to it when he spoke about the stocking Order, but I then discovered that that meant something else.
The category I refer to is that of women. I shall not go into the historical


reasons for giving concessionary coal to face workers; I assume that there are good reasons. I assume that there were good reasons for giving it to mineworkers who no longer worked on the coal face. I even assume that there were good reasons for giving it to people other than mineworkers who no longer worked on the face.
I shall no doubt be corrected, if I am wrong, by those more knowledgeable than, I concede, I am of these matters, but I do not believe that there was ever any pressure welling up from the mining industry for the concession to be extended to women workers, such as secretaries, shorthand typists, filing clerks, canteen workers and "Mrs. Mopps". I do not believe that these ladies were forcing such a concession out of the coal industry.
Of course I have great admiration for the work that all these necessary people do and I have every wish that they should be paid a fit and proper wage, but should they be getting concessionary coal?

Mr. Fred Evans: Surely the hon. Gentleman realises that part of the strength of the NUM is that it regards itself as an indissoluble union of workers in a particular industry and that the categories to whom he has referred are regarded in pay settlements and at all other times as an integral part of the industry, eligible for settlements across the board. It is when one of these women is a householder in her own right that she becomes entitled to concessionary coal.

Mr. Lawrence: I yield to no man in my admiration for the National Union of Mineworkers and the great cohesive force it has been in British industry over the years, and particularly the respect it has had for the women who work in the industry. But why is it that it has just at this particular moment awakened to the necessity to provide these women workers, for whom it has so much respect, with concessionary coal? Over the past 10, 20, 100 or 200 years these women have been an integral part of the industry and yet have not received concessionary coal.
I know the answer, in case hon. Gentlemen should think that was anything but a rhetorical question. It is the Sex

Discrimination Act. But at a time when the nationalised industries—and I wear my hat now as a taxpayer—are losing a fortune, at a time when the less well off and particularly the old-age pensioners are having to pay a savage increase in coal prices, can it be sensible to extend this concession of approximately a ton of coal a month or its value to all manner of women employees who neither need it nor expect it? If they need it, why was there not a concession of this kind for them before?

Mr. Ogden: I have a special interest here because my particular sponsors within the National Union of Mineworkers are the colliery officials and the staff association. The pressure for this concession has been going on for 15, 20 or 30 years. In some areas it was granted, because these are local agreements. The concessions do not go to every woman employee of the National Coal Board; they are still restricted. But surely almost every industry or profession has some perks, whether it be travel remuneration or advantages of another kind, for those who work in the industry, regardless of sex.
The Sex Discrimination Act helped, but it is not fair to suggest that a woman householder who works for the National Coal Board and now receives not a ton of coal, but perhaps 10 cwt., is getting that advantage at the expense of a pensioner. That spoils the hon. Gentleman's own case.

Mr. Lawrence: I have no wish to spoil my case and I accept what the hon. Gentleman tells me, that there was pressure, but I wonder how strong it was. I wonder also how, with the great humanitarian cohesiveness of the National Union of Mineworkers nationally, that pressure managed to be resisted until the very moment that we, in a moment of blindness or at any rate lack of foresight, introduced the 1975 Sex Discrimination Act. It seems fortuitous, an astonishing coincidence, to my simple mind, that this pressure should have come to the surface at the very moment that we passed that rather remarkable piece of legislation.
Will the Minister be good enough to confirm that the Order has now gone out from the National Coal Board to give this concession to all women employees


who are householders? Can the Under- Secretary confirm that this concession is likely to apply to at least 800 women employees, and that at a cost of nearly £30 per ton——

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Myer Galpern): There is some difficulty for the Chair here. The hon. Member is dealing with some existing practices. Could he help me by relating what he is saying to Article 3 of the Order which deals with redundant mineworkers, not with people who are remaining in employment?

Mr. Lawrence: I will certainly try to assist you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. As I read it, Article 3(iii)(c) of the Redundant Mineworkers and Concessionary Coal (Payments Schemes) (Amendment) Order 1976 deals with the position of coal industry employees in connection with concessionary coal, and that is the very matter that I am raising.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: We are dealing with the Coal Industry (Redundancy Payments Schemes) Order. We are not dealing with existing practices.

Mr. Lawrence: If you are having difficulty, Mr. Deputy Speaker, in grasping the way in which I relate——

Mr. Deputy Speaker: There is no difficulty in my mind. I wonder whether the hon. Gentleman has some difficulty.

Mr. Lawrence: Not really, Mr. Deputy Speaker, because I was about to ask the Minister whether he could say what effect Article 3(iii)(c) will have upon the granting of concessionary coal to women in the industry, according to the direction of the Chairman of the National Coal Board.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: If they become redundant.

Mr. Lawrence: I am grateful, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
Can the Minister confirm that, at a cost of nearly £30 a ton—that was the figure I understood, but the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Mr. Ogden) has opened my eyes to the fact that in his part of the world the price of coal approaches £50 a ton—this will cost the National Coal Board, and ultimately the taxpayer, more than £360 a year per woman employee, which approaches £250,000 at today's prices—and nearer £500,000 the price of nearly £50 a ton

which the hon. Member for West Derby is paying?
Will not the Under-Secretary admit that the concession, especially at this time, is a complete and absurd nonsense?

8.42 p.m.

Mr. Adam Hunter: I should like to speak about concessionary coal for people receiving redundancy payments. Under previous Orders of some years ago, certain people who became redundant before they were 60 received 90 per cent. of their net income and concessionary coal for three years, but when their period of redundancy ended they received no more coal. That was a severe hardship. I know one man who, after working 46 years in the pit, took redundancy pay just a few months before he became 60. His redundancy payments ended when he was 63, and since then he has had no concessionary coal. That is a serious anomaly. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will do something about it.

8.43 p.m.

Mr. Fred Evans: If one must bear in mind the Register of Members' Interests, I suppose that I should say that I am the son of a silicotic miner.
I pay tribute to the hon. Member for New Forest (Mr. McNair-Wilson) for his very fair speech and the humanity that he obviously feels towards this great industry. However much our business interests may want the industry to be sharp and wide-awake, we should not give it a microscopic examination and pick out tiny points. Aneurin Bevan once said that this island is made of the substance extracted by the industry. Through it we have the means to supply ourselves with energy in a world that will be increasingly starved of it, despite our oil reserves and those of the OPEC countries, which are finite.
In the coal industry, we have a source of energy which is almost infinite compared with these other resources. If used intelligently, it could bridge the gap and fill our energy needs until we get nuclear power. It could bypass many of the costs and balance of payments burdens that we now have to bear by importing oil.
I pay tribute to this great industry. We have agreed in the past that it is a special


industry which needs special treatment. It is important for the community.
There is a special human element in mining. Any form of mining is incomparably the most dangerous and arduous of all occupations. It carries the hazards of earth movements and explosions, which have so scarred mining history, and there is the continual problem of health hazards. In considering wage claims and other aspects of the industry, these dangers and hazards should always be borne in mind.
Reference has been made to the fact that the next NUM conference will consider a reduction in the retirement age of men in this arduous industry, but many other workers are looking at this idea as a possible way of reducing unemployment in their industries. For instance, teachers will be discussing a reduction in the retirement age, together with generous retirement provisions of a lump sum payment and pension. They would be retiring at an age when they could be retrained or take up other occupations using the skills they exercised in the classroom.
Most miners live in isolated areas and, adaptable though they are, there are not many opportunities for retraining or the redeployment of their skills.
It is a little niggling to look at the expenditure of the mining industry under a microscope, though I do not, of course, suggest that it should be allowed to run wild. We want to make the industry cost-conscious and competitive.
The Chairman of the NCB and I have crossed swords over a number of issues, but he has the well-being of the industry very much at heart and is well aware of the contribution that it can make to our national well-being.
We may argue about various aspects of the mining industry, but there is no doubt about the part it can play, under efficient management, in the general pattern of this country's economy.
The concessionary benefits are a patchwork inheritance from the former private owners of the mining industry. There are extreme variations in the concessions available from district to district and coalfield to coalfield. In my coalfield, if a man dies because of a chest disease, unless his death certificate gives that

disease as the primary cause of death, his widow receives no payments and no concessionary coal. In other coalfields, if the industrial disease is merely mentioned on the death certificate the widow and the dependants qualify. These are serious anomalies, which the Order is designed to tidy up.
In South Wales the taskmasters were very hard. I should like certain people to come into my coalfield to meet the irate women who, having lost their husbands in the coalfields after nursing them through fatal chest illnesses, receive no recognition other than a piece of paper saying "Well done, thou good and faithful servant. For 50 years in the colliery thou shalt receive nothing."
The nursing of the industry has to be a continuing process. If we exercise care and constraint I am sure that it will nobly see us through some difficult times in the next decade. The hon. Member for New Forest wishes it to be an exporting industry. So do we all, and that can be so. The great day of the industry will be when we do not burn coal, and when the new technologies of conversion are given their full head of steam and we become one of the great net exporters of coal.

8.53 p.m.

Mr. John Biffen: The House has been fortunate in being able to conduct a modest debate on the coal industry under the guise of the draft Statutory Instruments at an appropriate and convenient time. It has been a useful debate. I shall take up certain points made in the commendably brief speech of the hon. Member for Dunfermline (Mr. Hunter), who reminded us, in respect of the draft Statutory Instrument on concessionary coal, that this is an almost inchoate benefit that is conferred upon those who work in the industry. There is no unity of treatment, and there is a good deal of mild resentment at the partiality of its application.
My first question to the Under-Secretary of State, which derives from the speech made by the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Evans), is whether the draft Redundant Mineworkers and Concessionary Coal (Payments Schemes) (Amendment) Order seeks to rectify the anomalies to which reference has been made and whether, as a result, there will


be a more uniform treatment in respect of concessionary coal in the industry. I tend to err on the side of those who prefer payments in cash to payments in kind, not merely in the coal industry but across the whole spectrum of employment.
Our minds are focused on the concessionary coal issue, and the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Burton (Mr. Lawrence) has some bearing on this. If, as a result of the Sex Discrimination Act, a number of people become beneficiaries who otherwise would not have expected to be beneficiaries, the sense of injustice and partiality will not be alleviated. The reverse of that will happen. My hon. Friend should be congratulated on making that point because it is relevant to the application of the Statutory Instrument.
What kind of worker is defined for the purposes of the application of the Statutory Instrument? What, for example, would happen in the case of a typist who was a householder and was declared redundant? Would she be deemed to be a mineworker under the Statutory Instrument? It is legitimate to ask that question, although it may seem a minuscule issue to raise in the calm atmosphere of the debating chamber. But in a mining community these issues might give rise to a resentment and a sense of the ridiculous.
We welcome the courtesy of the Under-Secretary in apologising for the financial omissions in the draft Statutory Instrument. Doubtless he made his apology as a result of the kindly strictures made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Page), to whom the House is indebted for his chairmanship of the Committee. The omission is one of some substance. One does not have to be a Victorian workhouse master to have a regard for this sum of money, because it will have an impact on public spending of about £100 million.
I shall speak briefly about the Statutory Instrument on coal stocking support. I am anxious about that, and I think that anxiety is widely felt in the House. It derives from the stocking situation, not only in this country but in those countries which have been suggested as natural export markets. Mention has been made of the disposition of the Germans to take imports from Eastern Europe. The hon.

Member for Rother Valley (Mr. Hardy) has campaigned on the issue. I find the suggestion disturbing, because the Germans expect to have coal stocks amounting to about 28 million tons by the end of this year. That suggests that there may be a very serious problem affecting many of the major coal producers in Western Europe concerning coal stocks, and the news today that the Indians have a major stocking problem is a reminder that it is not merely a European problem. It implies considerable financial obligations on the taxpayer, whether they be borne through the Central Electricity Generating Board or through any other agency. I felt that the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Mr. Ogden) made that point very well.
I think that we ought to use this short debate to ask the Under-Secretary what his own expectations are about the use that will be made of the draft Statutory Instrument on stocking grants, and what he thinks are likely to be the trends in the levels of consumption and output and, consequently, of stocks.
The hon. Member for Caerphilly very properly gave us a little tour d'horizon of the coal industry. He did it with great skill, Mr. Deputy Speaker, under your eagle eye, within the necessary restrictions of these draft Statutory Instruments. He said that we must keep this industry competitive and cost-conscious. I am sure that that is so. Even if some additional headroom has been provided for the industry by recent exchange rate movements and their impact upon oil prices, the only sure foundation for a prosperous coal industry in this country is for it to remain competitive and cost-conscious.

9.1 p.m.

Mr. Eadie: One of my hon. Friends expressed pleasure at listening to the speech of the hon. Member for New Forest (Mr. McNair-Wilson), and I shall try to respond in the same spirit.
The hon. Gentleman spoke of what he described as the news of the "undignified spectacle" of the search for a new Chairman for the National Coal Board. To an extent, I agree with him, but I hope that he, in turn, will agree with me that the Government are not responsible for speculative articles that appear in the Press. I assure him and my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West


Derby (Mr. Ogden) that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State hopes to make an announcement very shortly. In view of that, I must ask the House to be patient.
My hon. Friend the Member for West Derby declared his interest as a member of the Miners' Parliamentary Group, although he said that he did not speak officially for the group. I too, happen to be a member of the group, and I can confirm that what he said about the appointment of a new Chairman to the NCB is a correct reflection of the Group's views.
The hon. Member for New Forest mentioned the agenda of the National Union of Mineworkcrs. Certain hon. Members get a great deal of pleasure when that agenda is quoted. The NUM is a very important body, and its conference is also important. It has been extremely radical over the years. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that it is an educative experience to study its agenda. In many ways, it would be no bad thing if other hon. Members could afford the time to go through the agenda——

Mr. Ogden: My hon. Friend should take the hon. Member for New Forest (Mr. McNair-Wilson) to the conference.

Mr. Eadie: Subject to my ministerial responsibilities, I hope to be able to manage a couple of days there myself.
The hon. Gentleman asked about pit closure policy, and whether I thought that the figures would jump substantially. At the moment I have no indication that they will. Pit closure is a matter for the National Coal Board, and indeed, for the National Union of Mineworkers. There is a procedural arrangement which has existed for a considerable time. It has worked reasonably well. I cannot give the hon. Gentleman any more information on that. It ties in to some extent with the third point, which I was very pleased that he made, concerning the Selby coalfield. He asked about the implications of the development of the Selby coalfield for coal production in the United Kingdom or, for that matter, the whole policy of Plan for Coal.
We are still awaiting approval from the Department of the Environment on the Selby coalfield, but it does not have any

implication in relation to the production of coal in the rest of the British coalfield.
The hon. Gentleman has heard me say before—particularly since I had been in the Department—that I have always rejected the peripheral coalfield philosophy. When we have a natural resource such as coal the Government seek to exploit it in the best interests of the nation. I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Evans) and my hon. Friend the Member for Dunfermline (Mr. Hunter) also bitterly resent the peripheral coalfield philosophy.

Mr. T. W. Urwin: While my hon. Friend is on the subject of peripheral coalfields, will he agree with me that the 550 million tons of coking coal reserves under the sea off the North-East Coast constitute a peripheral coalfield of great magnitude? Would my hon. Friend care to extend the argument which he and I had a few weeks ago in an Adjournment debate, about the serious implications of National Coal Board policy concerning exploration for the eventual development and production of a very large part of that quantity of coal, the problems encountered in the recent past, and the contribution that coal can make to the nation's tremendous problems with coking coal reserves?

Mr. Eadie: Had I noticed that my hon. Friend was present behind me during the debate, I might well have suggested that he would also resent the peripheral coalfield argument. I am sure that what I say will have my hon. Friend's endorsement as well. His intervention has underlined it. The vast quantities of coking coal are an asset to the nation. I endorse my hon. Friend's remarks on that point. No nation can hope to become great industrially unless it has adequate reserves of coal, and particularly coking coal, because the steel industry is of paramount importance in an industrialised country.
As to redundancy, and whether it will increase, I have some very interesting figures and I shall probably write to the hon. Member for New Forest. There is a new trend in the manpower figures, particularly in regard to the younger age groups. It gives us great heart and encouragement to find that there is a change in balance in the age of our manpower in the industry. Although I cannot


appear at the Dispatch Box as a prophet, I regard this manpower trend as to some extent very encouraging.
The hon. Member for New Forest mentioned concessionary coal allowances and the problems that arose in smoke-controlled areas. This subject has been widely discussed and debated for a considerable time. The hon. Member said that the scheme needed examining as more and more of these areas came into force. He must appreciate that the agreements vary throughout the different coalfields. To explain their structure and nature would involve a study of the history and development of the mining industry. What the hon. Gentleman said will be borne in mind, and I am sure that there will continue to be pressure, particularly from the unions, on this point. It is a good thing that this sort of subject can be discussed in Parliament and opinions voiced upon it. There are problems in deciding on a figure in lieu of concessionary coal for those whose homes do not burn solid fuel.
The hon. Member mentioned the stocking position and related it to the devaluation of sterling. He made a strong plea for an examination of the export trade and raised the question of third countries being involved over the supply of coal. When we joined the Common Market there was a general agreement on the need to minimise the intrusion of third countries, not only for coal but for other products. There has even been discussion in Europe on whether third countries should have access to Europe. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that there is an opportunity to increase the United Kingdom's share of this export trade.
The hon. Gentleman also referred to the absence of flues from some houses. This is a responsibility of the Department of the Environment, with which we have had discussions on the subject. Local authorities have discretionary powers in this respect, and here again it is a good thing for views to have been expressed in Parliament, not least about an element of choice for the consumer.
The hon. Member said that he wanted an efficient coal industry, and we all endorse that. He mentioned the position of customers and employees and suggested that the industry should strike out on its own. One way to do that would be to devise a thoroughly new approach

to the stocking of coal. I regard that as essential.
My hon. Friend the Member for West Derby mentioned the coal stocking position in relation to the electricity boards' approach, and expressed his concern about the matter. We are well seized of this. The National Coal Board has submitted certain proposals to us. That was why I coined the famous phrase—or so I am told—about a coal-fired power station "at a stroke". If we carried out a change from oil and gas to coal, we could quite easily get the equivalent extra coal burn of a new coal-fired power station. However, the matter is under negotiation and consideration. I am sure that all these matters will be considered.
The hon. Member for Burton (Mr. Lawrence) raised the question of women in relation to concessionary coal. I thought that he was amazingly courageous. There will not be many women in Britain who will thank him if they read some of his comments. However, I think we all understood what he meant, although it could be misunderstood. When Parliament passed the Sex Discrimination Act it became the law of the land. The NCB or any other undertaking must observe the law. As I said earlier, the whole question of concessionary coal agreements varies widely throughout the country. For the grade about which the hon. Gentleman was talking, there were already district agreements, under which male clerks, if householders, traditionally benefited. Under the Sex Discrimination Act the NCB was advised that it was compelled to give the concessionary coal similarly to female clerks who were householders, on exactly the same basis as to male clerks.
The hon. Gentleman asked for figures, and so on. In responding to that request, the best thing that I could do would be to write to him giving him the figures and a general explanation why the Sex Discrimination Act had to be operated on this aspect of concessionary coal. To some extent I am obliged to the hon. Gentleman for raising the matter in the House.
My hon. Friend the Member for Dunfermline, in a very cogent but short speech—as usual—raised the whole question of concessionary coal and the element of retrospection. The hon. Member for Oswestry (Mr. Biffen) also raised


this matter. It is very anomalous. I am seized of the points made. Frankly, this matter has always been anomalous. When we were making progress in the mining industry there always had to be a starting date when applying retrospective legislation. However, I must be fair and say that the unions themselves have approached the Government on the whole matter of retrospection and its effects. There are many unfair characteristics and anomalies, such as those mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Dunfermline, and my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly.
I have answered as best I can the main points that have been put to me. If there is any matter that I have not dealt with, I shall certainly write to the hon. Member who raised it. I hope that I have not been too long in explaining these necessary Orders. I think that the House will agree that a new future has been opened up for the coal industry in the last year or two and that it must not be prejudiced by short-term fluctuations.
We require a consistent approach from Government, so that the industry can properly chart and pursue its long-term course. This debate has shown that hon. Members on all sides of the House believe

that these Orders, which will extend the powers in the respects that I have outlined, will provide an essential part of the framework within which the industry operates. I am grateful for the constructive approach that has been adopted in this debate.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,
That the Coal Industry (Redundancy Payments Schemes) (Extension) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 17th March, be approved.

Resolved,
That the Coking Coal Grants (Extension) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 17th March, be approved.ffi [Mr. Eadie.]

Resolved,
That the National Coal Board (Pit Closures Grants) (Extension) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 17th March, be approved.—[Mr. Eadie.]

Resolved,
That the National Coal Board (Stocking Grants) (Extension) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 17th March, be approved.—[Mr. Eadie.]

Resolved,
That the Redundant Mineworkers and Concessionary Coal (Payments Schemes) (Amendment) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 17th March, be approved.—[Mr. Eadie.]

Orders of the Day — STATUTE LAW REVISION (NORTHERN IRELAND) BILL [Lords.]

Order for Second Reading read.

9.22 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary, Law Officers' Department (Mr. Arthur Davidson): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
The Bill relates only to Northern Ireland and is designed to improve the statute law in force in Northern Ireland by repealing obsolete, spent, unnecessary or superseding enactments, a wholly desirable object.
The Bill has already been before the Joint Committee on Consolidation. I pay tribute once again to the work of that Committee, and particularly to its distinguished Chairman, Lord Simon of Glaisdale.
Let me briefly tell the House that the Bill repeals 41 whole Acts or their equivalents. It effectively repeals no fewer than 221 enactments. I do not think that the House would wish me to go into each one of those. Therefore, I commend the Bill to the House.

9.24 p.m.

Sir Michael Havers: It is fitting that we should repeal so many old Irish Acts and enactments, having spent some three hours earlier today discussing the subject of Ireland. I do not see any Irish Members present in the Chamber to welcome this important measure, but I appreciate the great burden placed on the Parliamentary Secretary's shoulders this evening in piloting through the House this very important Bill.
I join with the hon. Gentleman in his congratulations to the Joint Select Committee on Consolidation on the tremendous amount of work it carries out on these measures, and I add my personal admiration for the ingenuity of the learned Chairman of that Committee, Lord Simon of Glaisdale. When recently he was faced with a situation of having no quorum in his Committee, and faced with witnesses who had travelled long distances to give their evidence, he managed to cope with the situation, he

took the evidence, and at the next meeting of the Committee he persuaded its members to adopt the minutes of evidence. That was a brilliant achievement it saved a great deal of time and money, and it has enabled the House to be able to deal so expeditiously with this Bill tonight.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Committee of the whole House.—[Mr. Arthur Davidson.]

Bill immediately considered in Committee; reported, without amendment.

Motion made, and Question, That the Bill be now read the Third time, put forthwith pursuant to Standing Order No. 56 (Third Reading), and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed, without amendment.

Orders of the Day — DOCKS AND HARBOURS (RATEABLE VALUES)

9.25 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Gordon Oakes): I beg to move,
That the Docks and Harbours (Rateable Values) Order 1976, a copy of which was laid before this House on 16th March, be approved.
The Order before the House concerns the rating by formula of hereditaments occupied by statutory docks and harbours. The port industry is one of several public utilities which are rated by formulae and most of the formulae have been reviewed over the past two years. The Order before us now is the result of the review undertaken of the formula relating to the docks and harbour industry.
It might help hon. Members if I briefly explain how the rateable value of the industry is arrived at under the present system. First, I should say that only premises on operational land are rated by formula. Offices, for example, not on operational land are valued and rated in accordance with normal rating practice.
Under the present system the rateable value of a dock or harbour undertaking in any year is 6 per cent. of the relevant receipts in that year up to a level equal to 6 per cent. of its relevant receipts in 1973–74, and 4 per cent. of any excess receipts over this level. Relevant receipts


are the undertaking's total receipts less receipts from cargo handling, pilotage and from certain specified investments and rents.
When the current formula was reviewed, the industry pointed out that it effectively meant that it was paying twice over for inflation. Relevant receipts of the industry have increased each year through inflation, although the actual amount of trade has in some years decreased. As rateable value is directly linked to receipts, it, too, has increased. But, in addition, rate poundages have increased to meet increased local authority costs, also due to inflation.
Thus, the docks and harbour industry alone amongst the formula rated industries has been paying poundage on a rateable value, both of which have been increasing with inflation.
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State accepted the industry's view that this was an unfair situation. In the Order we have taken steps to ensure that it will not recur by providing that in future relevant receipts will be deflated to constant prices by reference to the Retail Price Index. We have also reduced the percentage of relevant receipts to 4 per cent., and we believe that these two factors together will ensure that the industry's rate burden will, from 1976–77 onwards, be at a reasonable level.
I will now run briefly through the Order and explain its main provisions.
Article 3(2) provides that the Order shall not apply to very small undertakings or to certain specialist undertakings.
Article 4 provides that the rateable value in 1976–77 shall be 4¼ per cent. of relevant receipts in 1975–76, and in subsequent years that it shall be 4¼ per cent. of relevant receipts in the previous year deflated to 1975 prices by reference to the Retail Price Index. Under the present system the rateable value in any year is based on the relevant receipts for the same year. The Order provides that in future rateable value in one year shall be based on the receipts in the previous year. This is a minor change introduced to enable the rateable value to be fixed during the rating year in question instead of well after the end of the year as happens at present.
Article 5 outlines the machinery under which undertakings will have to notify their relevant receipts to the Inland Revenue and provides that undertakings may elect to declare receipts for the previous calendar year instead of for the previous rating year, if they so wish.
Article 8 provides that those undertakings which have already elected to do this may continue to do so without making a fresh election. I can assure the House that my right hon. Friend has consulted all those affected. As I have said, these changes have been effected because of representations made by the port industry. They have been agreed also with local authority associations.

9.31 p.m.

Mr. Tony Durant: We have no particular quarrel with this Order. It arises from our own Local Government Act of 1974 and the formula is clearly there enabling the Government to bring forward their own formula and to ask for an Order in the House.
I wish to raise only one or two questions. The Minister mentioned that he has taken the widest possible consultations. We are reassured by that, because it was an integral part of our Act that there should be widespread consultations.
Not being a lawyer I am slightly confused by paragraph (3) of Article 2 where there is some interesting wording which I will bore the House by reading:
In this order, unless the context otherwise requires references to any enactment shall be construed as references to that enactment as amended, extended or applied by or under any other enactment or by this order.
I believe that I understand what that means but perhaps when the Minister replies he will explain it because I am slightly confused.
The whole formula which the Government put forward in this Order is based on using the index, and there is no doubt that this is causing us some concern. I know that my right hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Page) feels very strongly on this matter and if he catches the eye of the Chair he may wish to raise a point on the index in relation to the Committee on Statutory Instruments. I will leave it to his experience and wisdom as Chairman of that Committee to deal with that point.
The Government are putting forward an interesting formula based on ability to pay. We on this side of the House have been pressing for a long time for an amendment of the whole rating system. Many of us have said that ability to pay should be one of the principal reasons for rating, and that the whole formula of rating should be based on ability to pay. It is interesting that we have here perhaps a step in that direction. There is no doubt that the whole rating system is in a confused and muddled situation. This Order is a complicated piece of legislation, though it is useful.
I was slightly concerned to hear the Minister say that it was thought that this industry needed help with its rates. Why not other industries? I agree that docks and harbours have been hard hit by inflation, but there are plenty of others in the same position. It all points to the fact that we badly need the Report of the Layfield Committee as urgently as possible and we need the Government to act on that Report to get this whole confused situation of rates cleared up so that everybody understands them and they are sensible, rational and reasonable. That is a matter of urgency. People are constantly pressing for this, and we on this side of the House say that it is time for something to be brought forward about it. But we support the general principle of this Order, apart from that slightly legalistic angle which I will leave to my right hon. Friend the Member for Crosby.

9.34 p.m.

Mr. Graham Page: I have no quarrel with the merits of the Order, because it has been agreed among all those concerned—the local authorities, the harbour authorities and the Department of the Environment. I notice that the Preamble says that it has been made only after consultation with all those authorities. Indeed, I am sure that the Minister will assure us that the matter has gone further than consultation, and that there is agreement among the parties that this is the right formula.
Under the 1974 Act the Secretary of State has the power to lay down a formula of this sort, but what he does not have power to do is to delegate the specifying of that formula to someone else. That is the point that I wish to

raise with regard to the index of retail prices for all items.
Article 4(2) begins:
For the purposes of this Article and of Article 5(3) being appropriate percentage of the relevant receipts shall be".
The appropriate percentage is an important item in calculating the rateable value and therefore the amount of rates payable by the docks and harbour authorities. For the year it is to be a set amount —4¼ per cent. of the relevant receipts in the year ending 31st March 1976. Paragraph (b) provides that
for any subsequent year, 4¼ per cent. of the relevant receipts multiplied by 140·5/y where y is the Index for September of the year to which the relevant receipts relate.
So one has to go back to something called "the Index" for the previous September. When one calculates it next year, the previous September will be September 1976, which is a date after the making of the Order.
When we look to see what is meant by "the Index", we see in the Interpretation Article, Article 2(2) that
'the Index' means the figure for the index of Retail Prices for All Items published by the Secretary of State".
That index is published, I understand, not by the Secretary of State for the Environment but by the Secretary of State for Employment—although I know that "Secretary of State" is a comprehensive term. It used to be known as the Ministry of Labour Index, and one finds it in the Department's monthly book. For September 1975 it was the figure that appears in Article 4–140·5. In this month's Department of Employment Statistics it is 147·9. There will probably have been an increase by next September.
I entirely agree with the principle of calculating these rates in relation to inflation. The Minister was right to say that with a fixed percentage year after year the docks and harbours would be paying for inflation twice over. This is a valid way of taking inflation into account.
It is a perfectly accepted principle in delegated legislation that the Secretary of State, who is given power to legislate by a parent statute, must not pass that power on to someone else. He is saying here that, by an administrative act—the publication of the index of retail prices month to month—the Executive can introduce new law into this Order.
It may be that, by way of normal practice, the index is always calculated on the same formula, but there is nothing statutory about it. The House cannot be certain that the index will be calculated on the same formula month after month. Indeed, a formula for a similar index has been altered only recently— the formula for the Statistics of Employment.
It is quite possible that in calculating the retail index for all items the Executive will decide at any moment to leave out potatoes and bring in cabbage. It can alter the formula of that index, and if it is altered to a substantial extent by executive action it will alter the fraction that has to apply under this Order, and it could therefore alter the rateable value of the docks and harbours by an executive act—not an Act of this House at all —and damage the whole basis of the agreement between the parties which have agreed to this—the local authorities, the docks and harbours and the Department of the Environment.
I do not know whether the Minister has any precedent for the use of the Index of Retail Prices for All Items, as it is used in this Order, but there are certainly precedents for saying that a Statutory Instrument should not refer to some document outside that Instrument if that document can be altered after the date of making the Statutory Instrument. The House dealt with this on the occasion of a Statutory Instrument that related to the British Pharmacopoeia. The Statutory Instrument said that the statements in that publication should apply in future, and that mat publication could be altered, I think, every six months or annually. The House also considered this in the case of a Statutory Instrument relating to Building Regulations, where the Regulations referred to British Standards and to any amendments of those British Standards in future after the Instrument had been made.
I have in mind some other precedents of this sort, but those are the two which are almost classic precedents in this House—that a Minister should not, when he is given power to legislate by a parent statute, legislate by reference to a document outside that Instrument which can be altered by executive act or, indeed, by

the act of some authority outside the House.
What we are doing if we pass this Instrument is giving power to the Executive to legislate. The Secretary of State for the Environment is delegating his power to legislate to the Executive in future in publishing the retail index. I have searched for precedents for this in other Statutory Instruments. It may well be that the Minister can produce a precedent, and I shall be very happy if he can, but as matters stand at the moment it seems to me that, having agreed that in future inflation should be taken into account, it would have been very simple to make a further Order annually, taking into account exactly what he is doing in paragraph (b), which I have quoted. It would be so simple to say that this would come before the House each year; that it was agreed with the authorities concerned that inflation ought to be taken into account in this way. This is a convenient way to do it. But when the formula is changed by a change in the retail index the House ought to know, and it ought to be brought before the House by a further Order.
This is troublesome, I know, but once we agree to a precedent of this sort I am quite sure we shall see Secretaries of State legislating by reference to some document outside an Order which can be altered by the Secretary of State or by anybody else, and the House will be bound by it without any knowledge of what is happening. In this case there is knowledge, by the fact that the retail index is published monthly, but it is not approved by this House; it is purely and simply a set of statistics issued by the Department of Employment without any reference to this House or authority, by statute, from this House.
I do not wish to disturb the agreement that has been reached between all the parties. I think that the formula is good, but it should be brought before the House annually when the figures of that formula are changed.

9.45 p.m.

Sir Michael Havers: It is clear that in principle the Order meets with the approval of both sides of the House. I want to do nothing that embarrasses the Government or the Minister, who is faced with a difficulty


of which he had even less notice than I had, though I gave him as much notice as I could. It is a matter which worries me.
The principles upon which references may be made to tables or guidelines outside the control of the House have always been frowned upon, to say the least. My right hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Page) referred to cases concerning the British Pharmacopoeia, and there were a number of Customs regulations in the old days of purchase tax on which exactly the same issues arose. My right hon. Friend gave as an example what would happen if potatoes were taken out of the Retail Price Index and cabbages were substituted. Another change which would be even more dramatic and probably be much welcomed by ratepayers would occur if caviar were substituted for cabbages. There would then be a striking increase in the cost of living which when put as "y" in the formula would be very effective in reducing rates.
One cannot expect the Minister to be able to receive at such short notice the advice to which he is entitled on such a matter, where we may find not only criticism but practical difficulties in the courts. We do not want that to happen on such a matter, which is obviously sensible and should be able to go forward without criticism. There is a wealth of talent and great legal experience tucked away in the Strand and the Minister's Department. The Attorney-General has been present in the House tonight and the Parliamentary Secretary to the Law Officers' Department was here until a few minutes ago. The Solicitor-General has not been here, and we miss him. If none of those who can advise the Minister is happy about the matter, they can always instruct Counsel at the Bar to advise them.
If my anxieties and those of my right hon. Friend are found to be unnecessary, we shall be delighted, but if there is something in them, I hope that the Minister will have the matter put right, so that we may have a formula whch nobody can criticise. It is in nobody's interests to have a formula which will not stand up to examination.

9.48 p.m.

Mr. Oakes: With the leave of the House, I should like to reply.
I thank the hon. and learned Member for Wimbledon (Sir M. Havers) for the notice he gave, albeit short. He himself had short notice of this rather technical point, which is more one of procedure than of any fundamental opposition to the way in which the Order has been drawn up, in what is perhaps a compromise. I see the difficulty which the right hon. Member for Crosby (Mr. Page) raised.
I wish to deal first with what the hon. Member for Reading, North (Mr. Durant) said. Awkward and difficult though the words of Article 2(3) may be, I understand that it is a routine provision. In effect, the words are intended simply to deal with amendments which might be made to enactments which are referred to in the Order or which are made by the Order.
The hon. Gentleman said that it was an interesting formula because it was based on ability to pay. The idea behind the Order is not strictly that. This is akin to Orders of the kind we have been dealing with in the Statutory Instrument Committee for the gas, electricity and other industries where it is almost impossible to provide an ordinary rating of hereditaments formula.
It would be too cumbersome a method to apply to the docks, just as it is too cumbersome to try to rate a pipeline or a gas terminal as a hereditament. In order that ports and these fuel industries pay a fair share of rates, the Order attempted, as did the previous Order, to find a suitable formula, which for the docks was based on receipts.
This formula was fairly easy to apply to the electricity and gas industries because, even though their rates increased as production increased, their revenue was increasing at the same time, so they were not hit by inflation in the same way as were the docks. We have all agreed that the docks industry was doubly hit by inflation, and that is the situation we have tried to cure. I should point out that the ports industry came to us and that full negotiations took place between my Department and the industry. This procedure was agreed by all parties as the best solution.
The Retail Price Index was not decided on in order to provide a devious way for the Executive to alter an Order


by its own act and not by legislation. It was agreed as the most appropriate formula for this purpose. The index has been in existence and fundamentally unchanged since 1962. There was a change when it was re-based to 100 in January 1974, but that was simply an arithmetical change which, if it happened again, would not have the effect to which reference has been made in the debate.

Mr. Graham Page: It would have that effect. We are using as a basic figure in this Order the September 1975 index level of 140·5. If there were another change to base it at 100 again and we were told to take into account the September 1976 figure, we would not be comparing like with like. It would make a great difference.

Mr. Oakes: An adjustment would be made to take into account the fact that the formula had been changed.
Reference was also made to the possibility of one item of food being deleted from the index and another being included, but this would not have a dramatic effect on the situation. I take on board what has been said about the situation which would arise if the whole basis of the formula were changed, in the way in which the compilation of unemployment statistics was changed.
I do not think that there should be an annual Order or that minor changes in the formula should be subject to the approval of the House. However, if a fundamental change in the constitution of the index—which has never been changed since 1962—took place, I agree that we should probably have to bring another Order before the House.

Sir M. Havers: I asked that there should be an undertaking on what would happen if the basis upon which the agreement between the parties was reached were changed. The minds of all those who came to the agreement were as one. The agreement was based on the present index figure of 140·5. If that should be changed by any Government decision, the House is entitled to an undertaking that the Order will also be changed to take account of it.

Mr. Oakes: I owe it to the House to give the undertaking if there is a fundamental change. I do not wish to commit

myself to saying that another Order would have to be brought to the House for a minor change in the formula. If the formula on which the Retail Price Index is drawn up is fundamentally changed, I give that undertaking to the House for which I was asked. The way in which the Retail Price Index is drawn up has not been changed for the past 14 years, and to my knowledge the Government have no intention of changing the formula.

Sir M. Havers: The word "fundamental" is capable of many variations. Would it be fairer to say "an alteration which any of the parties to the agreement could reasonably say was not the basis on which they made the agreement"?

Mr. J. W. Rooker: Unlike the unemployment statistics, fundamental changes in the Retail Price Index are made as the result of a report to my right hon. Friend by an advisory committee. The recent change involved in the mortgage payments was made because the advisory committee was asked to look at that matter by the former Secretary of State for Employment, Lord Carr. If the change in the Retail Price Index comes as a result of a recommendation by the advisory committee, that would be a fundamental change.

Mr. Oakes: There is an advisory committee, and if there were a fundamental revision, the Order would have to come from the Secretary of State. I cannot go as far as the hon. and learned Member for Wimbledon (Sir M. Havers) wants me to go in saying that if any of the parties to the agreement considered that the basis had been changed——

Sir M. Havers: I did not say that. I said if any of the parties could reasonably say that it was not the basis upon which they made the agreement. The courts are always interpreting "reasonably", whereas "fundamental" is capable of great argument. Somewhere between the two would be sufficient.

Mr. Oakes: We are getting into a legalistic morass over a hypothetical situation. In plain language, if there is a fundamental change in the way in which the Retail Price Index is drawn up, it has to be made by the Secretary of State, and I give an undertaking that


we would bring back the Order, because, if there were a fundamental change, the basis on which the parties made the agreement would have been changed. If that happens, I undertake to come back to the House. This may be a novel way to deal with the situation. Let us see whether it works.
I think that it will work, and on the basis of the Retail Price Index, the formula of which has been unchanged over the last 14 years, we can at least try it out.
I commend the Order to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,
That the Docks and Harbours (Rateable Values) Order 1976, a copy of which was laid before this House on 16th March, be approved.

Orders of the Day — BROADCASTING (JOINT COMMITTEE)

Ordered,
That the Lords Message yesterday communicating a Resolution relating to the appointment of a Joint Committee of both Houses to consider the implementation of the Resolutions of both Houses in favour of the establishment of a permanent system of sound broadcasting of their proceedings, be now considered.—[Mr. Dunn.]

Lords Message considered accordingly.

Resolved,
That this House doth concur with the Lords in the said Resolution.—[Mr. Dunn.]

Message to the Lords to acquaint them therewith.

Orders of the Day — STATUTORY INSTRUMENTS

Motion made, and Question put forthwith pursuant to Standing Order No. 73A (Standing Committee on Statutory Instruments, &c).

Orders of the Day — TOWN AND COUNTRY PLANNING (SCOTLAND)

That the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1972 (Commencement No. 4) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 26th February, be approved.—[Mr. Dunn.]

Orders of the Day — OVERSEAS TERRITORIES

That the Commonwealth Development Corporation (Extension of Limits on Borrowing and Advances) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 3rd March, be approved.—[Mr. Dunn.]

Orders of the Day — LEGAL AID AND ADVICE

That the Legal Aid (Extension of Poceedings) Regulations 1976, a copy of which was laid before this House on 10th March, be approved. — [Mr. Dunn.]

Orders of the Day — RATING AND VALUATION

That the Electricity Boards (Rateable Values) Order 1976, a copy of which was laid before this House on 11th March, be approved.— [Mr. Dunn.]

That the Gas Hereditaments (Rateable Values) Order 1976, a copy of which was laid before this House on 11th March, be approved.—[Mr. Dunn.]

Orders of the Day — NORTHERN IRELAND

That the Solicitors (Northern Ireland) Order 1976, a draft of which was laid before this House on 25th February, be approved.—[Mr. Dunn.]

Question agreed to.

Orders of the Day — ADJOURNMENT

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Dunn.]

Orders of the Day — BRECON BYPASS

10.1 p.m.

Mr. Caerwyn E. Roderick: Mr. Speaker, I am most grateful to you for drawing this debate in the Ballot for the Adjournment and for your attendance at the debate. I am also grateful to my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Wales— the Member for Flint, East (Mr. Jones) —for attending the debate. It is obviously a subject of burning interest, as witnessed by the attendance in the House. It shows that people are vitally interested in the subject.
I appreciate my hon. Friend's attendance, because I know what a sacrifice it is to come to the House on a Thursday night when one might be doing other things.
Brecon is situated on the junction of the A40 and A470. The A40 was the main road from London to South Wales. It is no longer so regarded, since the advent of the M4, but it is still an important artery. In the Brecon area the traffic on that road is mainly travelling from the Midlands to South-West Wales.
Recently the A470 was designated as the main trunk road between South Wales and North Wales, so its junction is important. It may explain why Brecon has the only set of traffic lights in the whole of my constituency, which is not a bad record for 1,200 square miles and goodness knows how many miles of roadway.
Brecon is typical of the small market towns of this country. It has the usual narrow streets, and in a part of the town centre we have created a one-way system. The many large vehicles passing through Brecon create a problem which is particularly serious in the summer. On a summer Saturday the town is one of the major bottlenecks on the routes to holiday resorts.
My hon. Friend will recall that last July, to ensure his safe arrival in Brecon, the Prime Minister travelled by helicopter. If he had not done so, he would have arrived for the close of our meeting. You, Mr. Speaker, will be well aware of this problem, because I am sure that you make due allowance for the delays that will be caused you when you travel through Brecon. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary was present at that visit last July. I am sure he must have left himself on hour of two in hand in order to be sure of arriving in time to greet the Prime Minister in Brecon.
A feasibility study has been carried out into a proposal to double the population of Brecon in the space of the next 25 years. This feasibility study has been accepted. Incorporated in the plan is the conservation and protection of the centre of Brecon, and an essential element in the plan is the bypass. It goes without saying that it is impossible to protect the centre of Brecon unless it is bypassed.
Over the years, travelling in various parts of southern England on holiday, I have become convinced that our towns should be bypassed. Our shopkeepers and traders used to object to bypasses, because they felt that their trade would lose out. Whenever I was in a long queue of vehicles trying to get through a busy town, I would never leave the queue in order to shop in the area; I would opt for a town that had a bypass. It was on an occasion like that that I was prepared to leave the bypass in order to shop in

the town, knowing that I could safely rejoin the traffic travelling past it.
Fortunately, the shopkeepers and traders of Brecon have changed their view. I recall that years ago they, too, held the view that they did not want a bypass, because of their fears about the loss of trade. Now they believe that a bypass is essential, and they are as keen as anyone in supporting this view. In fact, I know of little objection to such a proposal.
The proposal has been to build a 4½-mile bypass, mainly over agricultural land. There are some objections to that proposal, because of the loss of agricultural land involved, but I can think of no scheme that affects building so little. I believe that only one building is affected. In my short time in this House, I cannot recall an occasion when a new road has been proposed resulting in so few buildings being affected.
At present many schemes are going on in the Brecon area, and I know that there are difficulties because decisions about them are taken in a different sense. They are road schemes of a minor character, which are desirable but not necessary. We have had some nice improvements. They make a little bit more convenience for the travelling public, in that certain bends are cut out, but they are not essential, as is the removal of the bottleneck that Brecon produces.
I should like my hon. Friend to look at the whole of our expenditure on roads programmes. I understand his difficulties. He is not responsible for the choice of minor schemes. The population of the area became worried when they see money being allocated to various schemes around Brecon, when they would opt for the important scheme—the Brecon Bypass. They do not understand that the money so allocated could be transferred. I think that we should be looking at the nature of our expenditure on roads programmes to see whether we ought not to do what the public really want.
Let me deal with the bypass itself. In January 1973, mention of the bypass appeared in a list published by the Welsh Office. It appeared under the heading of schemes expected to start in the next two years or so. That was in January 1973. Draft line orders were issued in March 1973. In May 1974, my right hon.


Friend the Secretary of State for Wales announced that he saw no need for a public inquiry into the line of road.
On 10th December 1974 a public inquiry was held to consider objections to the draft compulsory purchase order from parties interested in the land that was to be acquired. That inquiry lasted one day, and that was the last we heard of it. That was 15 months ago. We believe that 15 months is long enough to wait for a report from a public inquiry. I hope that my hon. Friend will throw some light on the situation tonight.
We have also awaited, for a similar period, the result of an inquiry into the proposed road scheme at Storey Arms, near Brecon. Can my hon. Friend tell me something about this scheme?
Finally, about three years ago, in May 1973, I attended an inquiry into a proposal to close permanently the old road from Pontneathvaughan to Rhigos. I understand that a reply was sent to the objectors. I was one of them. It was sent in 1975, but no such reply has yet arrived on my desk; therefore something has gone wrong. We shall blame the Post Office in this case. The Post Office is ready to take the blame for many things. I should be grateful to receive the result of the inquiry, and the Secretary of State's determination on it. I shall be most grateful if my hon. Friend will add this to my request concerning the Brecon Bypass.
Once again, I thank my hon. Friend for his attendance and forbearance in accepting the delay to his departure to his constituency. He knows well enough that I should have been on my way as well, had it not been for the luck of the draw on this occasion.

10.12 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Barry Jones): My hon. Friend has asked about progress on the provision of a bridleway bridge over the Glynneath bypass in the vicinity of Pencae Drain Farm. As he will recall, my right hon. and learned Friend accepted the inspector's recommendation that although the Pontneathvaughan to Cwm-Hunt Road would be closed to vehicles, there should be a foot and bridleway bridge over the bypass.
In announcing this decision last April, my right hon. and learned Friend said the necessary orders would be made when the design and optimum position of the bridge had been finalised. A copy of the decision was sent to my hon. Friend on 8th April 1975. I shall, however, send him a further copy tomorrow. Work on this is being carried out by the West Glamorgan County Council as the agent authority, and I am awaiting its report.
My hon. Friend also mentioned the possibility of an early decision on the proposed improvement of the stretch of the A470 road near Storey Arms. There are important issues to be resolved here, but I can tell him that my right hon. and learned Friend will be able to announce his decision within the next few weeks. Subject to the satisfactory completion of all statutory procedures, I hope that we can start this improvement, costing about £200,000, in 1979–80.
My hon. Friend spoke eloquently and at length about the need for a Brecon Bypass, and I thank him for raising the subject. He never fails to press for the interests of his constituents, and I try, whenever it is humanly possible, to satisfy his demands and to be as helpful as I can.
I agree with him on the need for a bypass to reduce the flow of traffic through this beautiful and historic town. Its very attraction contributes to the congestion in the summer months, when holiday traffic combines with north to south and east to west flows which pass through it.
But in agreeing with him, I must do so with other considerations also in mind. The most important of these is the consideration which my right hon. and learned Friend must have for the priorities he should recognise in deciding which transport schemes should have first call on the limited funds that are available. This is a period of extreme financial restraint, and we have to weigh very carefully in any proposed road scheme the economic return we shall get as well as the environmental and traffic management returns. That is why our roads programme in Wales was reviewed recently, and some schemes in the preparation pool were suspended so that we could concentrate more fully on roads for which the justification was greatest.
We cannot build the M4 and every other road we want at the drop of a hat, and the decision—the correct decision— to concentrate on the M4 followed by the A55 has meant that we cannot start on other schemes as soon as we would wish.
The Brecon Bypass still stands as a very desirable scheme, and it is one on which my right hon. and learned Friend would like to make a start as soon as the situation allows. The orders fixing the line of the bypass and dealing with the side roads affected were made in 1974. Making these orders should have removed most of the uncertainty about which my right hon. Friend is concerned. Now only the compulsory purchase order which defines precisely the area of land required remains to be made. Whilst I must make the necessary resarvtions about the availability of funds and the successful completion of the outstanding compulsory purchase order procedure, present indications are that a start in 1980–81 may be possible.
But I know that my hon. Friend appreciates the restraints and the need for schemes to take their turn in a tightly-budgeted programme. His concern, I know, is that there should be a decision, and an announcement, so that his constituents will know where they stand. That is what he demands and that is what he is entitled to. I appreciate his concern as a true reflection of the concern of his constituents. He never misses an opportunity to take up cudgels on their behalf. Like him, I like to see quick decisions.
But in all matters concerning trunk road lines and compulsory purchase we have to get the right balance between speed and an exhaustive investigation into complaints and objections. My hon. Friend will agree that the rights of the individual objector must not be overridden in the interests of speed. In turn, I will agree with him that waiting for a decision is disturbing for people in the area affected by road proposals.
In the case of the Brecon Bypass the inspector recommended that we should look again at the possibility of saving the property of one of the objectors by altering the design of the road. This meant that after the inspector had carried out his inquiry and made his report my Department had to carry out further investigations

followed by discussions and correspondence with the owner and his representatives.
Having done this, we were then bound by the rules which govern the procedure of such inquiries to make the correspondence we had carried on since the inquiry available to the other objectors. The time limit within which the objectors had the opportunity to comment expired at the beginning of January, and since then a very hard-worked section in my Department has been putting together the necessary material to enable my right hon. and learned Friend to make his decision. I can now tell my hon. Friend that the Department will be putting a submission to my right hon. and learned Friend during the next few days and that he hopes to be able to take a decision and announce it in the week beginning 5th April.
Entering into negotiation and correspondence after an inquiry has been held is a fairly rare occurence which is bound to delay proceedings. It was, however, in the interests of an objector that we should do so. While the need to look further into the proposals has meant a delay in making and announcing a decision on the compulsory purchase order, it has not in any way affected the starting date of the scheme.
With the provisos that I have already made about finance and procedures, the scheme should start in 1980–81. Procedures concerned with schemes on which there are earlier starting dates therefore have to take some priority.
At an estimated cost of £8·6 million the bypass will, I believe, be a worthwhile investment. Its value to Brecon itself is obvious, as I think we would all agree. If there were any doubts, they have been removed after my hon. Friend's very forceful and effective speech. However, the bypass will also form an important part of the improvements we are making to the A470 as a more realistic contribution to the links between North and South Wales than the expensive motorway dreamed up by those who will never have to face up to the financial decisions involved.
My hon. Friend was in the Chamber a few weeks ago when he heard a scheme for an expensive motorway dreamed up by some who will never have to face


up to the reality of finding the finance and making the decisions involved. My hon. Friend has never put forward irresponsible solutions in this Chamber. He has always put forward the interests of his constituents, and he has never departed from the highest standards of realism.
It is in Brecon that the north to south route—the A470—crosses one of the important east to west routes—the A40— and the bypass will form part of both routes. It therefore also contributes to easier movement between the Llandovery area and the network leading to the M5 and the Midlands and West of England.
My right hon. and learned Friend is aware of the value of improving both of these routes. But he is also aware of the overriding need to press on with the M4

and with the A55, and there is no possibility of bringing the Brecon Bypass forward in his programme. He will however announce his decision on the compulsory purchase order—as I have said—the week after next.
In conclusion, I thank my hon. Friend for raising this very important matter. He has raised it in a most effective and timely way. He has once again demonstrated to the Welsh Office that his is a representation of his constituency that is of the highest order. We are full of admiration for what he does for his constituency. I thank him very much for the way in which he has put his case.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at twenty-three minutes past Ten o'clock.